RST Top 40: #4: Campo de' Fiori at Sunrise

market stalls opening up in the Campo

Campo de’ Fiori, in the heart of old Rome, has a storied history but we are ambivalent about its present.

The large piazza is named after the meadow of flowers that once occupied the land there, now replaced with an equally colorful, bustling market place much of the day. At night, it is a lightning rod for drunken young people of all nationalities, and a scourge of much of the neighborhood.

Still, how can one not be seduced by a piazza where a church heretic was burned at the stake (see our earlier post on Giordano Bruno - and the interesting comment to that post)? Where the cry for Italy’s independence was most heartfelt (think Tahrir Square)? Where Romans once built theaters?

bread coming out of the ovens at 5 a.m.

For us, the magic of Campo de' Fiori was restored when we scootered into it one weekday morning at 5 a.m. – to watch the market stalls being set up, the bakery bread being readied for the ovens. One could see, smell and feel the authenticity of a true market square.

And so, Campo de’ Fiori – at 5 a.m. anyway – makes our Rome the Second Time’s Top 40 at #4.

Dianne

PS – see also the University of Washington Rome Center’s lovely view over the piazza to St. Peter's in our post, Campo di UW.

Mixing religion and politics in the lively Campo de' Fiori

The dark metallic statue of Giordano Bruno, head lowered under his Dominican cloak and hood, has always seemed anomalous in the lively Campo de' Fiori. We force ourselves to think about a heretic burned at the stake in this center of Rome commerce and pleasure, where revelers party until dawn each night.

Bruno was burned alive in this piazza 409 years ago, on February 17, 1600, and the Church thought it had good reason. A defrocked monk, Bruno briefly joined the Calvinists (Protestants!) in Switzerland, and questioned a) Jesus as the Son of God, b) transubstantiation, c) the worship of Mary, and yes, d) all of the above (and more)--at least that's what came out in his trials under the Inquisition. He spent 1592-1600 in Inquisition jails. And, of course, unlike his contemporary, Galileo, he never repented.

Bruno was not only a heretic, but also a man ahead of his time. Before even Galileo, he held the stars were not fixed in the universe; he may have been the first person to theorize infinity. He combined scientific theory with a fascination for magic, making him a tough guy to appreciate in later centuries. [See Ingrid Rowland's new biography: Giordano Bruno: Philosopher/Heretic.] Bruno's work was intellectually revived (having been unknown for centuries) in the 19th century by the anti-Church forces, starting with (as usual) students at the University of Rome. After trying to make him into a figure of resistance to the Church through seminars on his work, the students came up with the notion of a statue. Intellectuals around the world, including George Ibsen and Victor Hugo, supported the cause.

The statue, designed by anti-cleric sculptor Ettore Ferrari, and erected in 1899, was the completion of the Italian conquest of Rome over the Papacy, "at least symbolically," according to historian David Kertzer in his 2006 book, Prisoner of the Vatican: the Popes, the Kings, and Garibaldi's Rebels in the Struggle to Rule Modern Italy (see Chapter 19: "Giordano Bruno's Revenge"). The planning for, and erection of the statue, was intended as a direct confrontation and affront to the Pope. When you're in Campo de' Fiori, imagine a parade of 10,000 people coming towards it, then only those with tickets in the Campo itself, over 130 members of Parliament on the reviewing stand, and the royal family and royal hangers-on not-so-discretely renting window seats in the then-poor apartments overlooking the square. There's still public acknowledgement of Bruno as a standard-bearer of "free thinkers" on February 17 each year.

So when you're throwing down a beer with fellow students at midnight, or having an 8 Euro glass of Fiano at the newest Campo wine bar at 7 p.m., or wrapped in nostalgia as the vendors set up their stands at 6 a.m., take the time to look closely as Bruno's presence. As one of the inscriptions says, "To Bruno - from the Century that he divined, here where he was burned at the stake."

If you're interested in more on the Inquisition tour, stop at the church just behind the Pantheon, Santa Maria Sopra Minerva. The monastery (open to visitors) attached to the church is where Galileo stood trial in 1633.

Dianne