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| Castel Sant'Angelo |
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Hadrian built his mausoleum on the banks of the Tiber in A.D. 135.
Originally the mausoleum had a small mound of earth (or tumulus) on top. The mausoleum housed the cinerary urns of all
the emperors from Hadrian to Septimius Severus (A.D. 211). The building was turned into a fortress during the reign
of Aurelian (A.D. 275). The popes also used the building as a fortress. They added turrets and bastions.
The wall connecting the Castel with the Vatican contains a covered passageway (the Passetto) which popes used to
escape the Vatican during times of danger. The Castel was also used as a prison (sculptor and metalworker Benvenuto
Cellini was one of the prisoners). The Ponte Sant'Angelo, from which this picture was shot, was originally built by
Hadrian in A.D. 136. The three central arches are original. The ten Baroque angels are the work of Bernini
(1667).
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| Fountain of the Rivers |
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Bernini created this fountain in the Piazza Navona in 1651. Each
river is represented by a sculpture. The four rivers are the Danube, the Nile, the Ganges, and the Rio de la Plata in
Argentina.
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| Palazzo di Montecitorio |
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The Palazzo di Montecitorio stands on the site of ancient funeral
pyres. It was begun by Bernini in 1650 and completed in 1697. In 1870 the building became the site of the lower
house of the Italian Parliament (the Chamber of Deputies). The piazza in front of the Palazzo contains an Egyptian obelisk
from the 6th century B.C. Augustus had brought this obelisk back from Egypt to be the center of a huge sundial he constructed
in the Campus Martius.
Let's look at some of the streets of Rome
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