Description
Campo de' Fiori is one of the liveliest squares in central Rome, between Piazza Navona and Palazzo Farnese: by day an open-air market, in the evening bars packed with young people, and in the middle the dark statue of Giordano Bruno. It is the only historic square in Rome without a church.
The market has been held here since 1869, when it was moved from Piazza Navona: wooden stalls and big umbrellas sheltering the goods, with a down-to-earth atmosphere that nineteenth-century photos show almost unchanged. The 1943 film “Campo de' fiori,” with Anna Magnani and Aldo Fabrizi, is set right among these stalls.
In the middle rises the monument to Giordano Bruno, by Ettore Ferrari: the philosopher and Dominican friar in bronze, on the exact spot where he was burned at the stake. Beside it, the Fountain of the Terrina, a copy of the one that once stood in the middle of the square.
The square reached its present shape only after 1858, when the houses on the north side were demolished. At the corner with Via dei Cappellari stands the Locanda del Gallo, once owned by Vannozza Cattanei; a few steps away are Piazza Farnese and the Palazzo della Cancelleria.
The name tells what was here before: until the fifteenth century this was not a square but a flowering meadow, with a few vegetable gardens. A rather unreliable tradition ties it instead to Flora, a woman loved by Pompey, whose theater stood right next door.
In 1456 Pope Callixtus III had the area paved, since it lay on the road to the Vatican. Ambassadors and cardinals passed through, inns and workshops sprang up around it, and twice a week a horse market was held.
But death sentences were also carried out in the square. On February 17, 1600, Giordano Bruno was burned alive here, accused of heresy. Almost three centuries later, republican students dedicated the statue to him on the site of the stake, with the support of Victor Hugo and Ibsen and against the open hostility of the Church: it was unveiled in 1889.
The market has been held here since 1869, when it was moved from Piazza Navona: wooden stalls and big umbrellas sheltering the goods, with a down-to-earth atmosphere that nineteenth-century photos show almost unchanged. The 1943 film “Campo de' fiori,” with Anna Magnani and Aldo Fabrizi, is set right among these stalls.
In the middle rises the monument to Giordano Bruno, by Ettore Ferrari: the philosopher and Dominican friar in bronze, on the exact spot where he was burned at the stake. Beside it, the Fountain of the Terrina, a copy of the one that once stood in the middle of the square.
The square reached its present shape only after 1858, when the houses on the north side were demolished. At the corner with Via dei Cappellari stands the Locanda del Gallo, once owned by Vannozza Cattanei; a few steps away are Piazza Farnese and the Palazzo della Cancelleria.
The name tells what was here before: until the fifteenth century this was not a square but a flowering meadow, with a few vegetable gardens. A rather unreliable tradition ties it instead to Flora, a woman loved by Pompey, whose theater stood right next door.
In 1456 Pope Callixtus III had the area paved, since it lay on the road to the Vatican. Ambassadors and cardinals passed through, inns and workshops sprang up around it, and twice a week a horse market was held.
But death sentences were also carried out in the square. On February 17, 1600, Giordano Bruno was burned alive here, accused of heresy. Almost three centuries later, republican students dedicated the statue to him on the site of the stake, with the support of Victor Hugo and Ibsen and against the open hostility of the Church: it was unveiled in 1889.