CENCI BOLOGNETTI PALACE ON PIAZZA DELLE CINQUE SCOLE

PALAZZO CENCI BOLOGNETTI IN PIAZZA DELLE CINQUE SCOLE

Piazza delle Cinque Scole 23

Several different buildings unified in 1570/85 for Francesco Cenci, the father of the infamous Beatrice Cenci

The relief of the land consists of ancient Roman ruins including perhaps those of the Temple of Castor and Pollux, or more likely of the AMPHITHEATER OF STATILIUS TAURUS, built in 29 BC, the first in Rome in bricks, eventually destroyed by the fire of Nero in 64 AD

Despite their claims of antiquity dating back two thousand years, the Cenci family reliably dates back to mid-1300s

CENCI BOLOGNETTI PALACE ON PIAZZA DEL GESÙ

PALAZZO CENCI BOLOGNETTI IN PIAZZA DEL GESÙ

Piazza del Gesù 46

1737 for Count Alessandro Petroni

It was an expansion of a preexisting palace of the sixteenth century

FAÇADE about 1745 Ferdinando Fuga (1699/1782)

As soon as it was completed it was sold to the Bolognetti family which ended in 1775 when the last female heir married Virginio Cenci

It was the seat of the Democrazia Cristiana (Christian Democratic Party)

“Fuga applied Mannerist quotes (pilasters of the first floor windows tapered down) and allusive references to Michelangelo (in the ground floor windows, in the projection of the windows pediments and in the moldings used as shelves under the windows of the second floor)” (Gaetana Cantone - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

CENCI SMALL PALACE

PALAZZETTO CENCI

Piazza dei Cenci 26

1579/84 Martino Longhi the Elder (1534/91) with beautiful courtyard and portico

It is connected to the Palazzo Cenci Bolognetti with the ARCO DEI CENCI (Arch of the Cenci family)

On the main floor frescos “Scenes of the Exodus of the Jews led by Moses” 1583/87 by Giovanni Guerra (1544/1618) and assistants, including Vitruvio Alberi (active 1575/dead after 1590)

“Giovanni Baglione reserved to Guerra in 1642 a very detailed biography, with a preliminary list of works (...) and the memory of his business capacity, which also contributed, with its scathing critical reviews, in the general devaluation of the late Roman Mannerism, to make forget the artist quickly, considered far from any appreciable qualitative standard. Only after the mid-twentieth century, initially through the study of his drawings, there was the beginning of the philological and critical recovery of the multifarious activities of Guerra, with particular attention to his ways of organizing a building site and the role of independent and original inventor of sacred and profane iconography” (Mario Bevilacqua - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)