Palazzo dei Convertendi
Palazzo dei Convertendi | |
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General information | |
Architectural style | Renaissance |
Location | Rome, Italy |
Palazzo dei Convertendi (also Palazzo della
Location
The palace is located in the rione Borgo of Rome along the north side of Via della Conciliazione. The palazzo's principal facade faces south.[1] The east facade faces Via dell'erba, which separates it from Palazzo Torlonia, another Renaissance building.[1] To the west lies Palazzo Rusticucci-Accoramboni, another Renaissance building demolished and reconstructed in the 1940.
History
Palazzo Caprini
Towards the middle of the 15th century, a house named "della stufa" stood at the northwest edge of the little
After Raphael's death, the building was sold to the Cardinal of
Palazzo dei Convertendi
Commendone had the palace restored by
Gastaldi, who died in his palace on 8 April 1685,[9] willed the edifice to the Hospice of the Convertendi, which moved there in 1715.[8][10][11] This institution, founded in 1600 by Pope Clement VIII (r. 1592–1605), was devoted to the protection of the Protestants who wanted to convert to the Catholic faith.[4][8] The palace was directly under the authority of the Pope, and was administered by elected members of the institute superintended by the Maggiordomo pro tempore of the Apostolic Palace.[10] The edifice was badly damaged during the flood of 1805, including the collapse of a vault in the basement, and restored by Pope Gregory XVI (r. 1831–46).[10] Under the reign of Pope Pius IX (r. 1846–78) it housed the Collegio Ecclesiastico from 1852 to 1854.[12] This was a seminary especially for English convert clergy that eventually became the Beda College. The palace underwent further restoration in 1876,[13] and Pope Benedict XV (r. 1914–22) had the monumental staircase built.[10]
Palazzo della Congregazione per le Chiese orientali
Pope Benedict in 1917 assigned the building to the newly founded
In 1937, during the construction of the
From 1939, when the reconstruction was still incomplete, the palace was home to the Magistero di Maria SS. Assunta school. In 1946, the school moved to new premises, also along Via della Conciliazione.[10][15] Since that date, the palace has housed several offices of the Holy See and the apartments of high-ranking prelates.[10]
Description
Palazzo Caprini
The original building is known only through etchings and drawings by contemporaries. These include an etching by
The building had two main floors. The lower one was
This rustication technique was quickly adopted in Rome, and the building, which had been inspired by
Palazzo dei Convertendi
Since that time, the palace occupied the whole west side of Piazza Scossacavalli, with six shops and two portals at its center.[17] The left portal introduced into the small church of San Filippo Neri, erected in the 17th century by the Spinola and containing only one altar.[7][17] The ground floor was surmounted by three floors, each with eight windows; those belonging to the piano nobile had centred and rusticated frames.[17]
The facade on Borgo Nuovo had a ground floor with five shops, interrupted by a rusticated portal surmounted by a
At the end of the 19th century, spurs of a geometric white and black sgraffito decoration were discovered on the facade, and a living room with a coffer ceiling at the northeast edge of the first floor was identified as the room in which Raphael painted his last works, including the Transfiguration.[17] At that time, a marble inscription commemorating the artist's ownership of the palace and his death there was affixed to the facade.[17]
Reconstructed palace
The building that exists today along Via della Conciliazione has two floors with a rusticated portal surmounted by Peruzzi's balcony.[18] The building receives light from square windows at the ground floor, centred and rusticated windows on the piano nobile, and rectangular windows at the second floor.[18] The roof is topped by a projecting cornice.[18] The elements of the windows, of the portal, and of the balcony were dismounted from the original edifice and reused here.[18]
In the building's porch, the aforementioned inscription is embedded in the wall, as well as a coat of arms of Alexander VI and another Latin inscription which reads:[18]
HEIC / RAPHAEL SANCTIVS / E MORTALI VITA DECESSIT / DIE VI MENSIS APR. / ANNO REP. SALVTIS MDXX
Here died Raphael Sanzio on 6 April 1520
The building has a yard with arches resting on rusticated Doric pillars sustaining spherical vaults.[18] On the first floor is a display of 120 Russian paintings on religious subjects, almost all produced by Russian painter Leonida Brailowsky (1872–1937).[18] The new palace also contains several frescoes from the original building in Piazza Scossacavalli, among them a group of lunettes attributed to the school of Pomarancio, five landscape paintings in the so-called Popes (or Patriarchs) reception room on the first floor, and two battle scenes in the Audience room.[19]
See also
References
- ^ a b Gigli (1992), Inside front cover
- ^ a b c d Gigli (1992) p. 44
- ^ a b Borgatti (1926) p. 163
- ^ a b c d Cambedda (1990) p. 55
- ^ a b c d Gigli (1992) p. 46
- ^ a b c d e Gigli (1992) p. 48
- ^ a b c d e f Dal Mas & Spagnesi (2010)
- ^ a b c d e f Gigli (1992) p. 50
- ^ Marcella Marsili (1999). "Gastaldi, Girolamo" (in Italian). Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Gigli (1992) p. 52
- ^ a b c Borgatti (1926) p. 164
- ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 24 November 2015. Retrieved 23 November 2015.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ Cambedda (1990) p. 57
- ^ "Lateran Pacts". aloha.net. p. Art. 15. Archived from the original on 23 May 2018. Retrieved 11 July 2015.
- ^ Gigli (1990), p. 90
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Gigli (1992) p. 54
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Gigli (1992) p. 56
- ^ a b c d e f g Gigli (1992) p. 58
- ^ Gigli (1992) p. 60
Sources
- Borgatti, Mariano (1926). Borgo e S. Pietro nel 1300 –1600 –1925 (in Italian). Roma: Federico Pustet.
- Ceccarelli, Giuseppe (Ceccarius) (1938). La "Spina" dei Borghi (in Italian). Roma: Danesi.
- Castagnoli, Ferdinando; Cecchelli, Carlo; Giovannoni, Gustavo; Zocca, Mario (1958). Topografia e urbanistica di Roma (in Italian). Bologna: Cappelli.
- Gigli, Laura (1990). Guide rionali di Roma (in Italian). Vol. Borgo (I). Roma: Fratelli Palombi Editori. ISSN 0393-2710.
- Gigli, Laura (1992). Guide rionali di Roma (in Italian). Vol. Borgo (III). Roma: Fratelli Palombi Editori. ISSN 0393-2710.
- Cambedda, Anna (1990). "La demolizione della Spina dei Borghi". Itinerari Didattici d'Arte e di Cultura (in Italian). Roma: Fratelli Palombi Editori. ISSN 0394-9753.
- Dal Mas, Roberta; Spagnesi, Gianfranco (2010). "Dalla Casa di Raffaello al Palazzo dei Convertendi". Quaderni dell'Istituto di Storia dell'Architettura (in Italian) (53). Roma: Bonsignori: 1–10. ISBN 978-88-7597-411-4.