Villa Altieri - "one of the most prestigious" 17th-century villas in Rome - hiding in plain sight

 Villa Altieri is one of those "Rome the Second Time" places in the middle of Rome rarely visited by the individual, and only occasionally by groups. Last year we encountered it only because we were interested in an exhibit featuring artists' responses to the Resistance in World War II (more about that in a later post). We had no idea of the place to which we were heading. What we found was a magnificently restored building, the kind of restoration for which few can match the Italians, and the layers of Rome that consistently surprise and delight us. At viale Manzoni 47, it's just steps from the Manzoni Metro A stop , on the edge of the Esquilino quartiere.

Above, the monumental entrance to Villa Altieri. Today one enters on the ground floor, beneath these grand staircases.

The palazzo is a 17th-century building. Pope Clement X (1670-76) was an Altieri, giving the family money to build this villa on top of an earlier structure.

The main hall of the ground floor of Villa Altieri has exposed "scavi" - excavations - from the earlier villa and from Roman times.

A collection of antique statues and other works is well-displayed in the various rooms. It's described as a small museum for the "prestigious" collection of the families that owned the property. Through the glass floor (a little disorienting when one first walks on it) one can see the "ancient" cobbled floors of the prior villa and the "archaeological stratifications" discovered in the restoration work.

That's me, focused  on the art exhibit. You can see the glass floor beneath my feet and some of the statuary in the hall.

A little of everything - the glass floors with
ruins below, a statue from the museum's
collection, a view out to the gardens, such
as they remain, and, center right, a painting
of Antonio Gramsci from the
 Resistance exhibition.

The city of Rome acquired the villa in 1975 and began restoring it in 2010. It's now the city's headquarters for "Culture and Historical Memory," with an archive open to the public that includes the Library of the Metropolitan City with the Historical Archive, the Study Center for literary research, linguistic and philological Pio Rajna , with the Dante Historical Library. (I'm using the site's English translation - links provided). 

The "museum" supposedly has visiting hours, but the website is woefully out of date. I suggest going when there is an event or exhibit and one can be more sure of it being open and accessible.

Facebook may provide the most up-to-date information on opening days and times. Specifically "Amici di Villa Altieri" here. It shows current events and exhibits. (Don't be misled by the Palazzo Altieri elsewhere in Rome or the Villa Altieri hotel in Albano.) 

On the other hand, the villa is so accessible, you can try simply stopping by. It's a lovely site, quintessentially Roman, with surprises from many eras.

City website on the villa here: https://www.cittametropolitanaroma.it/homepage/elenco-siti-tematici/villa-altieri/

A print - with description - from the Stanford collection here: https://web.stanford.edu/group/spatialhistory/vasi/catalog/appendix/vn195.html

Description of a bas relief with Mithras, here: https://www.mithraeum.eu/monument/475

Dianne

(Part Two of Villa Altieri - the exhibition of Resistance art- will be the subject of a subsequent post.)

Walking the (Aurelian) Wall (III): the Tame and the Wild Sides

A handsome portion of the wall, near the Pyramid, with a tropical look

This section of the Aurelian Wall, running from Porta San Paolo and the Pyramid to the Tevere (and Porta Portese), has two faces: one quite touristy and civilized, the other rather odd and possibly even a bit dangerous.  It is noted by some as one of the longer, intact stretches of this third century wall, once encircling all of Rome.  But the stretch has its limitations, as RST discovered. [Update: a Google map that includes this itinerary.]

To the left of the Pyramid, a short section
 of the wall, extending toward - but not to -
Porta San Paolo; here you also can see
where the wall  has been removed for traffic.

The tame, or civilized phase begins at the Pyramid (here, a part of the wall - another "existing structure" used to build the wall quickly in 271-75 AD).  Because this area is well known for armed resistance to Nazi occupation of Rome in 1943, the wall here is a resource for memories of that moment.

Remembering the dead

The pillar (photo right) remembers 471 people who died defending the city.  Just beyond, between the Pyramid and the wall proper, volunteers who care for the hundreds of cats that live in a special facility here, were closing up for the day.






And beyond that, the wall itself is impressive (see photo at the top of this post), even if the grounds on the outside of the wall are unkempt and full of evidence that a lot of drinking is done here: not only bottles but dozens of bottle caps embedded in a stump.  Though we're on the outside here, the inside of the wall is accessible in this area through two cemeteries: the well-known Non-Catholic Cemetery, which contains lots of important bodies, including that of the Italian intellectual Antonio Gramsci, and the haunting (British) Commonwealth Cemetery just across via N. Zabaglia, just ahead (both, again, inside the wall).

Mailbox for wall "address"

Now things get a bit funky.  As we continued beyond the small turnabout/piazza, following the outside of the wall, we passed a man relaxing in the weeds, then came upon a locked gate to which was attached a mail box, as if someone had once (or still did) live inside. 

Street-cleaning/garbage truck facility restricts access to wall

At this point the wall continues as part of an Ama (trash-collecting, street cleaning) facility.  We decided we would not have been welcome inside.  So we tracked back, hoping to follow the wall from the inside, past the front of the Commonwealth Cemetery, then a bit downhill onto the road that curves (clockwise) around Monte Testaccio, with its cool collection of late-night bars.

The Aurelian wall is somewhere ahead.  To the right,
the wall of the ex-Mattatoio

Following the curving road, in a couple of minutes we ended up at the long, straight road that fronts the ex-Mattatoio (literally, Killing Center, what we call a slaughterhouse, once a stockyard).  Heading left, toward the Aurelian wall (not yet visible), graffiti covering a portion of the ex-Mattatoio, then right--there's just a glimpse of the wall here--along a row of houses occupied, we think, by new and poor immigrants, Romanians and others, perhaps Roma (Rom, "gypsies").

A glimpse of the wall, between the wall of the ex-Mattatoio (left) and housing (right)

NO TAV graffiti, inside the ex-Mattatoio

Dianne would go no further.  Bill took the first right, then a quick left, quickly observing a row of about ten home-made shacks and a big barking black dog (which was fortunately chained).  Bill, too, retreated--from danger and likely embarrassment--and our not-so-intrepid couple retraced their steps to one of several open entrances to the yards, heading to and beyond a heavily graffitied tower at the center of the complex (of the graffiti on the walls to the left, note the nice train with
the NO TAV sign: in northern Italy, especially, there's strong opposition to a proposed new high-speed train (Treno Alta Velocita) through the French and Italian Alps.

The wall ends--or appears to end.  Photo taken from train.
Despite the sign, we are still in Testaccio, not yet across
the Tevere in Trastevere.

At the far end of the large open area of the ex-Mattatoio there's another road, inside the complex, leading left.  Not useful, we decided, in locating the wall.  So we left the complex, ahead and just to the right, through an exit onto the Lungotevere Testaccio that wasn't open a year ago.  Walking left, the road ends abruptly after about 200 meters, at a railroad bridge over the Tevere.  We still can't see the wall, and-- from a train several days later--we saw why: the wall, too, ends abruptly before it reaches the river.

Along the Tevere.  If not part of the wall, what is it?

We're thinking that the wall planners didn't see any necessity for a wall along the river--a sort of natural barrier--but there is an existing wall-like section, including a tower, along the road that runs above the river here, and some - but not all - maps show the wall was indeed here.

Tent housing, along the bank of the Tevere

But (we're trying to think this through) if the Aurelian wall had been built along the expanse of river from the railroad bridge (to the south) to Ponte Sublicio/Porta Portese (to the north), then surely there would be visible remnants of the wall.  And there are none--except, possibly, that tower and related remains--or none to be seen from the road, anyway. Another theory - that the remnants of the wall became part of the now-high river embankments.  But, back to our trek: below the road, near a path that runs along the river bank, people are living amid weeds in tents and huts.  Not for tourists, not even us.

A favorite bar, at corner of via Galvani and via
N. Zabaglia.  Time for an aperitivo.  

Today's search for the wall at an end, we turned back into the ex-Mattatoio,  past the old stockyards and the giant Bambu' installation that is part of MACRO Testaccio, along the bars and clubs built into Monte Testaccio, to the next corner and one of our favorite bars.  We were lucky.  It was 6:05 p.m., and five minutes earlier happy hour had begun: an aperitivo and plenty to eat, a photo show of historic Testaccio, and all for Euro 4 per person.  What a city!


Bill   

Rome's Worst Public Sculptures: Nominees, Group 1

For some time now, as we've wandered Rome's 'burbs, byways and backwaters, we've been observers of Rome's lesser-known public art objects: the sculptures in the city's mostly outlying parks and piazzas, intended to bring a little history and culture to what tourists would consider the boonies.  Many, though not all, of these sculptures were installed in the 1990s and early 20th century as part of the Cento Piazze (one hundred piazzas) program of former Rome Mayor Francesco Rutelli, a venture we applaud even as we express reservations about some of its artistic achievements.

The Piazza Bologna area is no backwater, though tourists will likely not have found it.  It's on Metro B, the third stop northwest from Termini.  You'll find our first example just a few blocks south of the exit, which is in Piazza Bologna proper, straight south down viale delle Provincie to Piazzale dell Provincie, a bustling place, decidedly unfriendly to pedestrians.  In the center of the Piazzale is nominee #1.  If you manage to reach the sculpture, you'll find that each of the outlying posts represents an Italian city, and the posts are group by province.  Duh!  Bill appreciates the effort to give concrete (pun!) expression to Italy's provincial matrix, and he thinks the whole is more inventive than the monolith fad that inhabits some other piazzas.  Dianne thinks she could design something better in about ten minutes.  Years ago (an expression designed to put the moment in the far away past) Bill did the ugly American routine --while on an evening out with Italian friends, no less)--and climbed the structure.  You can, too.  If you can get there. 

If you're a tourist pussy and Piazza Bologna's too far off the beaten track, we recommend Pietro Consagra's "Giano nel Cuore di Rome," available for viewing at the top of the city's financial district at the end of Largo S. Susanna.  To get there, begin at Piazza della Republica and walk northwest on via Orlando, ignoring the Moses Fountain (which will no doubt be covered for repairs, anyway) on your right and proceeding on for an additional 50 meters or so, to the "Giano."  Unfortunately, even our big print dictionary provides no hint of what a "Giano" might be, though an urban dicitionary site offers this definition: "An interesting gothy type of man.  Usually bigger built, but extravagently [sic] gorgeous.  Often has a warm heart, but can be pushed toward aggression for the things he loves."  You can't make this stuff up.  We definitely sense some gothy thing going on here.  The Zanichelli dictionary offers some help: Giano is Janus, the Roman god who managed the universe by looking forward and backward.  Or, as Dianne commented, "it looks like gumby." 

After Giano anything looks good, and maybe that's why we have a soft spot for the next nominee.  You'll find it south of the Centro, in Largo Bompiani.  You can't get there, but if you could you would follow via Cristoforo Colombo to Piazza dei Navigatori, then walk about two blocks left/southeast to the small park that constitutes the largo.

We don't know who made this sculpture or what it's supposed to represent, but we like it enough to hope it doesn't get too many votes for Rome's worst public sculpture.  It's got nice weight and volume, looks different from different angles, and from more than one perspective seems to have something to say about machinery, perhaps combined with a statement about the Holy Roman artichoke (this view not pictured).  If you stay around, you'll no doubt have other thoughts and may discover who did it.

We're headed to via Ostiense and then Metro A, which is about a mile away, across via Cristoforo Colombo and down via delle Sette Chiese.  About halfway there via delle Sette Chiese emerges into a large, oblong piazza: Largo delle Sette Chiese.  At the far end, in the center of a busy traffic circle, is our next quarry.  You're now in the quartiere of Garbatella, long (and still) a hot-bed of Leftist politics, and so it's fitting that this community's entry in our sculpture contest would be dedicated to the anti-Fascist, anti-German, and predominantly leftist (and Communist) Roman resistance.  Indeed, the 40s-style lettering in the concrete explains that the structure before us was dedicated in 1974 on the "Trentennale (30th anniverary) of the Resistenza Romana."  Despite the community's interest in such matters, the work has not been well cared for; the concrete is in disrepair, and long grass has nearly taken over. 

The sculpture (above left) consists of a bunch of metal spikey things embedded in the concrete, some of them protruding into boxes.  The penetration of the boxes might be said to represent death, or perhaps the containment of hope and aspiration by the forces of evil.  Perhaps the boxes on spikey things stand for people.  It's likely the sculptor had some idea in mind.  Still, it seems to us another over-determined failure from that awkward decade, the 1970s.  Given its treatment, apparently the community thinks so, too.  

More to come in a second installment.  Hold your breath.
Bill