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September 12, 2012
Is Rome still "The Eternal City"?
By Carlo Ungaro
There is a unique quality in Rome, which often escapes the notice of visitors: it is a city that lives its history like few others
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"I hate Barocco!
I hate Scirocco!
I hate
So went a little doggerel, very popular in
There are, in fact, moments when, in the more "modern" part of
A short walk away is an older, perhaps even more captivating part of the City, where the Pantheon rests, perfectly at ease in spite of its great age, in that Fifteenth and Sixteenth century Rome which is in many ways more enchanting, albeit less spectacular.
It is, however, precisely the "newer" part of Rome, the reign of the "Barocco", which brings home the fact that this, indeed, has always been and still is the "Eternal City". The appellation of "Roma Caput Mundi" was applicable for many centuries after the Roman Empire had formally ceased to exist and even after the end of the
It is enough to spend some time at the Caffè Greco (often patronized by Hans Christian Andersen), at the beginning of Via Condotti, and to reflect that, within a radius of about a quarter of a mile there lies more history -- visible, living history -- than most other cities can offer in their entirety.
Keats lived in nearby Piazza di Spagna, while further up the erroneously labelled "Spanish Steps" lies Villa Medici, site of the
In the other direction, on the Via del Corso, is the apartment where Goethe spent some years of his life, and following this, which for centuries was Rome's principal avenue, a very short walk leads to the incredibly beautiful Piazza del Popolo in which, through the main gateway to Rome, the Porta del Popolo, many made their triumphal entry, as conquerors, liberators or guests. Among these -- as we are reminded by an inscription on the main gateway - was Queen Christina of Sweden, a Catholic convert in self imposed exile, who was to spend the last thirty years of her life in Rome, a popular and equivocal figure, being at the same time a self-avowed lesbian and carrying on a long, tempestuous and very public affair with one of Rome's most prominent Cardinals..
At the other end of the avenue lies the Capitoline hill, the seat of Imperial power, ,from which Gibbon viewed the ruins of the Forum, getting the inspiration to write one of the most beautiful and readable history books ever written, "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire".
The rivalry between the sculptors and architects Bernini and Borromini (who hailed from
Almost every street name in Rome evokes a slice of ancient, medieval, Renaissance or modern history: one of the main shopping avenues is named after Cola di Rienzo, a man of humble origins, whose meteoric rise to fame and leadership in the fourteenth century, seemed destined, for a while, to change the history of the entire Italian peninsula. He called himself a "Tribune" and had huge popular support, only to be finally unseated and killed by those very masses who had hailed him as a saviour.
One intriguing aspect of
Also the Romans, in spite of the vast number of new generations, appear to have retained their intriguing combination of placid indolence and fiery temperament. It is not difficult to imagine them chasing a Pope into exile, murdering a tyrant, assassinating the Emperor's emissaries, only to return to the warmth of the family to enjoy a steaming plate of "maccheroni al cacio e pepe", washed down with copious draughts of the white, deceptively light "vino dei Castelli".
Walking through
Carlo Ungaro