Description
The Pincio Promenade is the public garden on the Pincian Hill, above Piazza del Popolo, in Rome. You reach it by ramps and hairpin bends from the square, and it is one of the city's most celebrated viewpoints, with the panorama reaching to the dome of St. Peter's.
In 1851 Niccolò Machiavelli became Archimedes, and Savonarola turned into Guido of Arezzo. No miracle: Pope Pius IX, arranging the busts of famous Italians on the Pincio, changed the names of those the Church disliked. The heads, though, stayed the same.
The garden was born during the French occupation, with Napoleon's backing. Between 1810 and 1818 Giuseppe Valadier designed it together with Piazza del Popolo, joining them with ramps and hairpin bends up to the great terrace. It was the first public garden in Rome.
Don't miss the panoramic terrace, dedicated to Napoleon: from here you see Piazza del Popolo, the Prati district, St. Peter's, Monte Mario and the Janiculum, and to the south the Vittoriano and the Capitoline. From the Pincio opens one of the most celebrated panoramas of the city.
Along the avenues are hundreds of busts of famous Italians, commissioned by the Roman Republic of 1849 to give Italy an open-air pantheon. After 1870 those who had been left out came back too, and by the end of the 1960s there were 228.
Then the obelisk of Antinous, dedicated by Hadrian to his favorite and brought here in 1822, and the water clock on the Viale dell'Orologio, set up in 1873. Its mechanism is attributed to a Dominican father, Giovanni Battista Embriago.
The Casina Valadier, built by Valadier in 1813 on the earlier Casino Della Rota, immediately became a café and a place to contemplate the city.
The hill was already a garden in antiquity: here were the gardens of Lucullus, where Messalina, wife of Claudius, was killed. For this reason it was called the Hill of Gardens. Its present name comes from the Pincii, the family who had their villa here in the fourth century.
Since 1908 an overpass above the Muro Torto has linked the Pincio to Villa Borghese: you can continue on foot to the park.
In 1851 Niccolò Machiavelli became Archimedes, and Savonarola turned into Guido of Arezzo. No miracle: Pope Pius IX, arranging the busts of famous Italians on the Pincio, changed the names of those the Church disliked. The heads, though, stayed the same.
The garden was born during the French occupation, with Napoleon's backing. Between 1810 and 1818 Giuseppe Valadier designed it together with Piazza del Popolo, joining them with ramps and hairpin bends up to the great terrace. It was the first public garden in Rome.
Don't miss the panoramic terrace, dedicated to Napoleon: from here you see Piazza del Popolo, the Prati district, St. Peter's, Monte Mario and the Janiculum, and to the south the Vittoriano and the Capitoline. From the Pincio opens one of the most celebrated panoramas of the city.
Along the avenues are hundreds of busts of famous Italians, commissioned by the Roman Republic of 1849 to give Italy an open-air pantheon. After 1870 those who had been left out came back too, and by the end of the 1960s there were 228.
Then the obelisk of Antinous, dedicated by Hadrian to his favorite and brought here in 1822, and the water clock on the Viale dell'Orologio, set up in 1873. Its mechanism is attributed to a Dominican father, Giovanni Battista Embriago.
The Casina Valadier, built by Valadier in 1813 on the earlier Casino Della Rota, immediately became a café and a place to contemplate the city.
The hill was already a garden in antiquity: here were the gardens of Lucullus, where Messalina, wife of Claudius, was killed. For this reason it was called the Hill of Gardens. Its present name comes from the Pincii, the family who had their villa here in the fourth century.
Since 1908 an overpass above the Muro Torto has linked the Pincio to Villa Borghese: you can continue on foot to the park.