FIFTH posting -- The Colonna Gardens

FIFTH BLOG POSTING 3 April 2016 

The Colonna Gardens

Greetings from Roma.

We had another splendid Saturday a week ago. That time we left early for our postponed visit to the Palazzo Colonna, and there were no transportation difficulties in arriving. I especially wanted to take the extra tour of their gardens, which we had forgone last year on our previous visit, concentrating instead on the fabulous artworks and architecture inside.

The Colonna family still owns their palace, which is almost two square Chicago city blocks in size, and their gardens, which extend up the Quirinale Hill.

Today I'm going to show you the gardens, with only a fraction of the lovely paintings, frescoes and furnishings inside.

(a reminder--there may be a small link to click on to SEE MORE. There are over 40 photos in this posting. You can skip my blather by clicking on a photo.)

Here's the locator map. The Colonna Palace, their garden and the other views are within this purple oval. The blue arrow is where the Quirinale piazza is, with the adjacent palace that used to be one of the papal summer residences. North is up. 

A 3D Google map!
The Colonna Palace and garden
are within the red box.
The yellow box most likely
was part of their gardens
earlier, because the
monumental entry gate is at the blue arrow.

Detail view of Google 3D map. 

The 1718 monumental gate
(closed off now) to the
Colonna Gardens
atop the Quirinale Hill. 

An impressive entry,
very convenient to the
entry of the Papal Palace,
which is now one of the
official residences of the
President of Italy.

Piazza Quirinale,
with a small part of the
Papal Palace, (right), and the former Papal stables--now a hall for fine art exhibitions (left).
The two massive statues of the horsemen (the Dioscuri semi-divinities who were also brothers of Helen of Troy) in the center were originally in the Baths of Constantine, which were very near here. 

To give you an idea of the "standards of the neighborhood", here are two views of nearby gardens.

A tiny glimpse into the
extensive gardens of
the Quirinale Palace.

A small view into the very private
estate of the Palazzo Pallavicini Rospigliosi, "across the street" from the Colonna gateway.

A view from the early 1900's
of the eastern edge
of the Colonna Gardens. An edge of the Palace is on the left.

A view of the same area,
about a city block further off.
Don't worry, I was crossing
the street on the "WALK" light.
Note-can you spot the open archway on the left,
to the right of a
bright yellow bus' end?

Here's a view of that same archway
from inside the
Colonna Palace.
This is one of their
two main courtyards.   

More of the same courtyard. 

Here's another of their courtyards.

I've blogged about their
collections before but
wanted to give you a
reminder of their
level of style.
(That's scarcely
an adequate word for
this marvelous palace.)
This is Pope Martin V,
Oddone Colonna, 1369-1431.
Again, there are several
books about his ending
the era of schisms
(extra Popes) that arose
at the end of the
Papacy's exile in
southern France.
He also did a great deal
to put Rome back on
its feet after the 67 years
long absence of
the Papal Court.

One of the many Cardinals
over the centuries from
this family.
Girolamo I Colonna
(1604-1666) commissioned
many of the paintings
in the gallery from famous
Bolognese painters
and was the one
who started
the family gallery.

Portrait of Stefano IV Colonna
by Bronzino, done in 1546.(now in the State Museum
of the Barberini Palace) 

Above, The "Hercules Room"
in the ground floor apartments,
(a couple of the other rooms
are shown below)
done up in the 1600's. 

 

The Colonna Gardens

Left, view over one of the bridges to the gardens. 
Below right, a view from that bridge of the street via Pilotta
and the other bridges to the gardens.

This outside wall makes an intriguing start for the garden visit.

A two page drawing of what the undeveloped gardens looked like in the 1500's. This slope of the Quirinale Hill had been part of the ancient baths of Constantine from before 315 AD. Much of the splendid marble decorating the Palace came from these ruins.  

Part of the ancient walls, incorporated into later buildings. The guide said there is a major effort underway to study the remains of the ruins.

When I first heard about the reuse of the ancient marble and stones, I winced. But at least these were saved and not turned into lime for brick mortar as where so many ancient statues and marbles in the medieval era.
One time a guide pointed out that with the fall of Constantinople in 1453, shipping in the Mediterranean became difficult, and there was no way to obtain "fresh" marble and materials for columns, floor and wall decorations. So the ruins were harvested.

The construction of the nearby
 Palazzo Rospigliosi (1605-1621)
is held to have caused
the greatest part of
the destruction of the
remaining ruins of
the Baths of Constantine. 

 

What else is known to have been in the Baths of Constantine?

The bronze statues of boxer and athlete now in the Museo delle Terme, 

the "Torso Belvedere" now in the Vatican Museums, a couple statues of Constantine, one in the porch of St. John Lateran, the others in the Musei Capitolini, et cetera. Don't ask about what was found when the traffic tunnel "Il Trasforo" was dug beneath the Quirinale Hill in the last century, although those finds were not from the Baths of Constantine. However, you'll notice those pieces in the Capitoline and the Palazzo Massimo museums in Rome. 

This is another of the reasons we love Rome, there is so much to see and to discover. But I'm wandering off topic, as usual.

The garden portions on the hill slope
are laid out in lateral terraced areas.
It is probably still a bit soon
to see any flowers outside.
On the left retaining wall are
various fragments of ancient sarcophagi and tombs. 

A door on a pagan sarcophagus usually represents
an entry to
the "Other World".

A view back towards the Palace
from about 1/3 of the way up
the garden slope.

It was a splendid day, and the view
over the rooftops was very fine.
Left is part of the Vittoriano Monument
at the nearby Piazza Venezia.

This water cascade and backdrop
are a highlight of the lower garden. 

No home is complete without
a few ancient deities
and sea-creatures! 

The baroque era mosaic
was redone in the 1900's
and looks grand. 

One of the statues on the
cascade is Dianne,
goddess of the moon
and of hunting.

At the top of the garden is a path along a wall. A gate permits a view into another part of the garden. I don't know if this is still used by the Colonna family or is now part of another parcel, but the monumental gate would be at least a few hundred feet beyond this area.

I stopped sighing after a view
of the rest of the park and
turned around to see this view. That's St. Peter's dome off to
the right. Mid level left is half of the dome of the Pantheon.
The large building stretching across the center is the Jesuit church of St. Ignatius.
There were no funds
left over for a dome,
so they had a fake one
painted inside,
but that is another tale. 

Here's a composite shot of the panorama.

**** End of this posting ****

All photos and text are
© Carol H Johnson, 2016, 
with the exception of the 
web photo of Pope Martin V.

Happy "Pesce d'Aprile" (April FISH -- or April Fool's Day)

FOURTH blog posting, 1 April 2016

Dear friends, relations, and readers,

No, this isn't one of those "please send all your money" email tricks, or even a cartoon-style bucket of water over a soon-to-be-opened door. But Happy April Fool's Day, anyway. 

The Italians enjoy the "Pesce d'aprile" day (April Fish). Here's two online ads from EATALY for 1 April. They are having a special tasting and sale of fish, at least at their Rome store.

Yes, it says "pearls before swine" at the bottom.

I'm posting some of my sillier photos. A few are visual tricks that happened by chance, some are carefully designed Baroque-era visual puns, riddles or illusions. 

Nice looking courtyard near the Pantheon, yes?

Same courtyard, before photo cropping and cleanup, showing too many cars.

Jesuit church "Il Gesù".

Complete with real dome, loads of marble, frescoes, saints and angels.

Here's the start of a big surprise in the church's transept, over the tomb of St. Ignatius (the founder of the Jesuits).

Some basic info:
1568:  The church's construction began.
early 1700's: The altar (and tomb for St. Ignatius himself) created.
1773:  The Jesuit Order suppressed. (It did come back later.)

WHAT this is: A very tall statue of St. Ignatius, originally of cast silver,
with the latest in 1700's technology to lower the painting that normally hides it. There presumably was also some mechanical music played, too.

1797:  The silver statue (probably hollow core but still real silver) was melted down to pay Napoleon and his occupying troops. The machinery in the basement was forgotten about for two centuries.


What's here now is a copy, merely silver coated and gilded.There is a modern light-and-sound show of the statue being revealed daily in the church, usually around 5:30 p.m.  
This display does make a big visual impact, but I personally prefer the small, very simple nearby room that St. Ignatius once lived in.

Gladiator glamor??

Beneath the rounded northern end of the Piazza Navona are the brick cores of the remaining underpinnings of the Stadium of Domitian. Last year a special exhibition was held there of a private collection of re-created gladiator equipment.

This "ugly duckling" type is thought to have given great advantage in dodging the
"nets of Neptune (god of the Sea)" in hand to hand combat.
The pairs of gladiators were matched by types of weapons and defenses and by style of fighting.
The gladiators were usually highly trained, skilled, (and expensive) slaves.

The "styles" changed over the few hundred years that gladiator games were held, and many of these adaptations gave advantages during specific types of combat. Some of these pieces were created to be used in various "swords and sandals" films. Not all of these outfits were scary; a few were to imitate a deity.

"Boxing gloves". Nope, there was not any extra padding outside. These sometimes had spikes or sharp edges, too. There were also matches were literally "no holds were barred". The modern film pugilist "Rocky" would have had trouble fighting with these in a "Pankratio" fight.

 Turtles and Fountains

The Fontana delle Tartarughe is becoming a popular, minor tourist stop. There is another "turtle fountain" in Rome, not as elegant as this late 1500's embellishment to the Piazza Mattei (near the Largo Argentina). The other one is behind the Villa Giulia (now the Etruscan Museum), in a small garden.

Well, yes, you can easily tell which is a fancy fountain and yes, there are four turtles there having a "sun bath" in a small water bubbler-pond. One never finds souvenir post cards of these little charmers, while the other fountain graces many a memento.

"Weighty" Matters?

Several of the older churches have reverently kept some odd objects, usually near the entrance door, for many centuries. Legends sprang up that these mysterious objects were stones tied to martyrs when they were thrown into the Tiber, or used to crush them alive, et cetera. 

The centuries-long April Fool jokes on those pious, imaginative but under-informed medieval folks was these were the official ancient Roman weights and standard measures for the markets, that were kept in the temples that later became the early churches.

This photo may be a bit dark, but there are three such standard weights at the bottom of this caged display. Chains are often thought to have been torture tools, and perhaps some may have been.

Roman temples were often used as savings banks for the people (nice, safe and secure places), or as depositories of state funds (the Temple of Saturn in the Forum is a prime example). Mercantile contracts were firmed up by being sworn to in a temple, with a set number of Roman citizens as witnesses. 

Oaths were often taken in Temples to the god Mercury (or Hermes to the Greeks). Everyone knew Mercury had several roles, pious ones as the messenger of the Gods, as the conductor of souls to the otherworld, but also as protective patron of travelers, merchants, thieves and liars. 

Street performers.

There are many performers, musicians and hucksters awaiting the visits and coins of tourists. These laddies were at the rear of the Pantheon earlier this week.

What attracted my attention was the number of guys, presumably from the same town, all hanging around the fakir.
 
Yes, he looks as if he is sitting on air. The poor schmoo is supported by a steel plate on the ground, (covered by flower petals), a steel post or two and a body harness.

I presume the seven plus fellows hanging around were to
a. collect the coins offered,
b. keep a watch out for the cops,
c. be able to haul away the steel supports, and
d. have a relief sitter.

 My basically nasty mind was also wondering if they were keeping an eye out for where the tourists would put their money back after making a donation? Possibly these guys were keeping an eye out for OTHER pickpocket scouts, or possibly I've been in pick-pockets' heaven (Rome) too long??

RECOMMENDATION:

IF you are going to give some money to street performers or beggars, before you leave for the day, stow a few buck's worth of coins in a pocket you can easily reach.

DO NOT wander around Rome without some form of a hidden pouch, worn around your neck under your shirt, or a thin money belt, also kept hidden. Obtaining a new passport is complicated, time consuming and not cheap.

PLEASE do not keep your ATM card PIN number anyplace where it can be snatched with the cards. This happened recently to a Roman I know and is every pickpocket's dream come true.

For several years now, Emil has kept an extra, worn-out wallet holding only some cut newspaper in it in his back hip pocket as dummy-bait for the pickpockets. Perhaps it is an April Fool joke on them?

 
Roma, la Città Eterna

Rome doesn't change MUCH, but it does change. Here's a late 1600's painting by Van Wittle of the Tiber and Castel Sant' Angelo (at that time a Papal fortress and prison, originally the large tomb for the Emperor Hadrian, now a grand museum). 

That's a water powered grain mill floating in the river. The seventy foot high flood walls were not added until the late 1800's, and neighborhoods (and government buildings) surrounding the Castel didn't arise until then. St. Peter's is off this scene to the left.

Security Check lines 

at St. Peters'

Even before the recent wave of terrorist attacks in Paris, Brussels, LaHore, there have been security checks before entering St. Peter's. The lines have always been awful. 

Some twenty years ago these checks were rather casual, one would walk in single file past a couple of bored looking officers who might take a visual peek inside a larger bag one was carrying. For the past several years this has been upgraded to x-ray bag scanners and walk-through metal detectors like in airports. 

This year is the first time there have been portable set ups for scanning bags and people at the major basilicas. The lines at St. Peter's are always the longest, because that's where people want to visit.

The piazza in front of St. Peter's. Notice the tiny dots, midway up the left side? That's the end of the line for the security clearance checkpoint. (This was NOT the start of the line at all, its head was near that construction scaffold in the mid background.)

Below is the rest of that line. This photo is from 2011. The lines haven't improved much over the years.

Solution:  GO EARLY, well before nine a.m. if you don't want to stand around for an hour or so to enter.

The Walking Wounded. 

I spotted this healthy looking fellow, who probably never wore high heels, making his way to Santa Maria in Trastevere. Almost every day I see young girls hobbling along with crutches or canes to cope with a sudden foot problem. I've even occasionally seen young women limping barefoot, holding onto their flimsy sandals.  

Do wear very good, sturdy shoes when you come to Rome. Do some ankle, foot and leg strengthening exercises beforehand, unless you are already a prime athlete. Don't let the cobblestones and uneven paving make an April FOOL out of you. 

One of the best jokes in Rome

does not start out with " . . . a funny thing happened on the way to the Forum . . ." but rather with this very complex optical illusion in the courtyards of the Palazzo Spada, built starting in 1632. Part of the Palazzo is a small museum (the rest is government offices). Many people on limited time budgets come to see this forced perspective and then have to scamper off without enjoying the small painting gallery upstairs.

The illusion was extended by frescoes of columns on both flanking sides, which of course have faded and fallen over the past 250 plus years.

A view down the right side. It was carefully calculated by a mathematician for the superb architect Borromini.

This looks as if it is very deep, but it isn't. It looks as if it is 37 meters long (it is only 8) and the statue in the rear is only 60 cm high.

(26 feet is forced to look like
121 ft. and the statue is only
2 feet high instead of the
expected life-sized deity.)

Streets with odd names.

Many very short streets in Rome have names that seem odd nowadays, usually because the original function, church or building is gone. The evolution of old dialect can make for odd sounding names, too. I have noticed at least three THICK books on the subject, and so will give you only one example,

the street of the chair makers, 

via dei Sediari. 

I remember in the early 1980's there were still several chair makers (chairs with straw or cane seats) and straw objects makers (trays, baskets, etc.) on this little block long street south of the Pantheon and the Piazza Navona. 

In the last year or two, a number of fancier shops have sprung up in this area where a goodly number of tourists wander by. There are still a couple of nice, small bookshops (almost exclusively books in Italian) and there is ONE chair maker left. Not much of an April Fool's joke, though.

This is also not quite an April Fool's joke.
This deer or elk(?) atop St. Eustachio is the symbol for the sainted martyr. An ancient Roman soldier was out hunting, and was about to slay his prey when a cross appeared between the antlers of the creature. He converted to the then illegal Christianity and was soon martyred for his new faith. 

All over Rome one can find high Tiber flood markers, this one on the side of St. Eustachio near the Pantheon dates to a flood in 1495 when the Pope was Alexander VI Borgia. Mutterings sprang up among the populace how the severity of the flood was a sign from the Heavens of disapproval of this "bad boy" Pope.

A long-time favorite,
an elephant created by Bernini in the 1600's
to hold an ancient Egyptian small obelisk
then recently found under the adjacent church's building's
(Santa Maria sopra Minerva),
very near the Pantheon.

What else can I say except
"Happy April Fool's Day"

THE END of this posting.

all photos 

(except as otherwise noted) 

and text are 

© Carol H. Johnson, 2016.