Rome Across the Centuries

The Pantheon is defined by a massive concrete dome that has remained the world’s largest unsupported dome for nearly two thousand years. Its most striking feature is the central opening, or oculus, which serves as the only source of light…

The Basilica of Saint Mary of Minerva stands out in Rome for its rare Gothic architecture, featuring soaring rib vaults that contrast with the city’s more common Baroque styles. Built starting in twelve eighty on the ruins of an ancient…

The Trevi Fountain is a massive travertine stone facade, eighty-six feet high and over one hundred and sixty feet wide, that dominates the small square where three streets converge. As the dramatic terminal point of the ancient Aqua Virgo…

The National Museum of the Palazzo di Venezia is recognizable by its severe, fortress-like exterior, built with travertine stone taken from the Colosseum and the Teatro di Marcello. Constructed between fourteen fifty-five and fourteen…

The Victor Emmanuel the Second Monument is impossible to miss at the head of Piazza Venezia. It is a massive structure of gleaming, white Botticino marble that stands seventy meters tall and one hundred thirty-five meters wide against the…

The Piazza del Campidoglio is defined by its precise, trapezoidal geometry and a central oval paving design that radiates outward from a bronze equestrian statue. Perched atop the Capitoline Hill, this square sits at the historic center of…

The Theatre of Marcellus rises above the street with a striking facade of stacked stone arches, their tiers framed by classic columns that once inspired the design of the Colosseum. This massive structure, originally seating over eleven…

The Colosseum rises as a massive, elliptical structure of stone and concrete, immediately recognizable by the four tiers of arches that ring its exterior. Originally called the Flavian Amphitheatre, it was commissioned by Emperor Vespasian…