Regola is a corruption of the Latin word renula (fine sand). The name of the street and square, Arenula, is also derived from it. The area was once subjected to the overflows of the Tiber, along the eastern bank of which it stretches, and was covered with river sand. By the end of the 19th century, the banks of the river were bounded by high embankments, and the frequent floods of the past ceased.
In the Middle Ages, the area was called Regio Arenule et Chacabariorum, in which the second word refers to the Chacabarians, coppersmiths who made cauldrons and other kitchen utensils. Two nearby churches, Santa Maria in Cacaberis (later Italianized to Santa Maria de Calderari) and San Salvatore in Cacabariis (renamed Santa Maria del Pianto in the 16th century), were also named in their memory.
Regola has long been famous for its craftsmen, among whom leatherworkers, who used mainly deer skins in their work, were particularly notable. This is how the deer got on the coat of arms of the district. The names of some streets, as in neighboring Parion, remained connected with the professions common here earlier – making combs, crossbows, pools, etc.
The neighborhood is bounded by the streets and squares of via dei Banchi Vecchi, via del Pellegrino, via dei Cappellari, piazza Campo dei Fiori, via dei Giubbonari, piazza Benedetto Cairoli, via di Santa Maria del Pianto, via del Progresso (forming Piazza Cinque Scole), lungotevere de Cenci, lungotevere dei Vallati, lungotevere dei Tebaldi, lungotevere di Sangallo, vicolo della Schimia and via delle Carceri.
In ancient Rome, the area occupied by Regola was part of the Field of Mars and corresponded to part of Regio IX (Circus Flaminius), with its lower half adjacent to the river.
The heart of the district is Piazza Farnese (1), until the first half of the 16th century called Piazza del Duca. The square is adorned with two twin fountains made from ancient stone baths found in the thermae of Caracalla and is enclosed on the southwest by the magnificent Palazzo Farnese.
The palace was commissioned for his family by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese (future Pope Paul III). Its construction lasted for three quarters of a century – from 151 to 1589. The work was interrupted for 14 years after the sacking of Rome in 1527 and several more times for various reasons. The first architect was Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, who after his death (in 1546) was replaced by Michelangelo, who designed the balcony and cornice. The construction was completed by Giacomo della Porta, who in 1564 built the back of the mansion and built the arch over the Via Giulia.
The Palazzo is considered one of the finest Renaissance buildings in the city and is one of the so-called “Four Wonders of Rome”. This assessment is given to it not only because of its magnificent appearance, but also because of the sumptuous frescoes that decorate its halls. The mansion is also often referred to as the “Farnese Cube” because its width and depth are the same.
The rhomboidal pattern in the upper part of the façade is obtained by using bricks of different colors – less burnt yellow and more burnt red. The coffered cornice running along the edge of the roof is in typical Renaissance style and is decorated with carved flowers, each one different from the others.
After the death of the last member of the Farnese family, Cardinal Odoacer (1626), the mansion stood abandoned until the second half of the 17th century, when it was occupied for a few months by Christina of Sweden. It was then given to the Bourbons, the Royal Family of Naples, and in 1874 to the French government.
In 1936 the ownership of Palazzo Farnese passed to the Italian government, which made it the residence of the French embassy in Rome, concluding a lease for 99 years for a symbolic fee of 1 euro per year (1,000 lire before the introduction of the single European currency). Thus, the mansion still retains extraterritoriality.
It is a curious coincidence that the lily (or heraldic fleur de lis) was the heraldic sign of both the Farnese family and the royal family of France. This flower is depicted several times on the building, as well as on the top element of the twin fountains in the square.
Behind Palazzo Farnese, almost parallel to the course of the Tiber, runs via Giulia (2), the oldest long and straight street that crossed the medieval labyrinth of alleys of Regola. It was opened in 1508 by Donato Bramante on behalf of Pope Julius II along what was once an ancient Roman road. The northern section of Via Giulia is mentioned in the description of the Ponte district. Its southern part, belonging to the Regola district, is most interesting for the buildings behind Palazzo Farnese.
The early 17th-century fountain leaning against the wall, known as the “Mascherone (grotesque face) on the Via Giulia” (3), is built from remnants of antique marble. Its top is topped by another Farnese lily cast in bronze, reminding passers-by of who were the masters of the neighborhood.
Just a few meters from the fountain, the street is bridged by the Farnese Arch (photo above), an airy corridor connecting the back of the historic mansion to the buildings on the opposite side of the street. Today’s low houses have replaced the old complex known as the Farnese Cabins, where the family kept a rich collection of statues and other works of art. These Cabinets were decorated with paintings by famous artists such as Annibale Carracci, Domenichino and Giovanni Lanfranco. After the demolition of the complex, only three small frescoes by the last artist survived. They are now preserved in the neighboring church of Santa Maria del Orazione e Morte (5).
In fact, the Arch of Farnese was planned as the first section of a private bridge that would cross the Tiber, connecting the family mansion with another wealthy residence on the opposite side of the river, acquired by the Farnese from the Chigi family in 1580 and named Villa Farnesina (6). The project was not completed and the arch remained as a passageway to the art collection.
Next to the arch is the aforementioned church of Santa Maria del Orazione e Morte (Prayer and Death). The main business of the “brotherhood of good death”, for which this church was built in 1575, was to collect the unclaimed corpses of peasants and beggars lying in the open in the countryside for their Christian burial. The church itself had a crypt that served as a cemetery for many brethren. The current appearance of the building dates from 1733-1737, when it was completely rebuilt by a member of the brotherhood, the architect Ferdinando Fuga.
The main motif of the exterior and interior decoration of the church is death, represented by winged skulls by the same Fuga. The crypt is illuminated by lamps made of human bones, and two small plaques held by grinning skeletons warn: “Today it’s me, tomorrow it’s you (Hodie mihi cras tibi)”. Two old alms boxes, which can still be found on Via Giulia, bear allegories of time (winged hourglasses) and of the same death (skeletons).
The cemetery, which extended down from the church towards the Tiber, was radically reduced in the early 20th century when walls were erected along the river banks to prevent flooding.
The human skulls on display should come as no surprise. Since Baroque times, several Roman churches have openly displayed such symbols of death on the walls and ceilings of their crypts. This custom lasted until the early 19th century and has only now come to be considered bizarre and gruesome. Now only two Roman churches preserve examples of such art – the aforementioned St. Mary’s Church and the more famous Capuchin Church on the Via Veneto.
To the right of the church adjoins a mansion built in the 16th century and enlarged by Francesco Borromini in the 17th century. Its edges are marked by pilasters surmounted by falcon heads with a female bust. The palace originally belonged to the Cecchi family, but was soon sold to the Odescalchi, then to the Farnesi and finally, in 1635, to the Falconieri, whose heraldic element was the aforementioned figure.
A number of researchers claim that the female bust under the falcon’s head is a reference to the female members of the Falconieri family, known for their external attractiveness.
A few years later, the Falconieri bought the adjoining buildings and commissioned Borromini to rebuild them into a single building. Unfortunately some of Borromini’s architectural designs were lost in the 19th century during the reconstruction of the promenade, where the main facade of Palazzo Falconieri actually faces. What remains of the master’s work is the façade on the Via Giulia side, the loggia overlooking the Tiber and the decoration of several rooms.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the mansion was sold to a Hungarian scientist who bequeathed it to his people. Thus, since 1927 Palazzo Falconieri became the seat of the Hungarian Academy in Rome.
About 250 meters north, on the border with the Ponte district, there is a large building with windows covered with thick iron bars. These are the so-called New Prisons (6), “which Pope Innocent X built in 1650 for justice and mercy, for the safer and gentler confinement of prisoners”, as stated in Latin on a large plaque hanging above the doorway.
The actual use of the building as a prison began only in 1658, because immediately after its construction, a plague epidemic broke out in Rome, and the New Prisons became a quarantine place to isolate the sick from the rest of the city’s population. Today, the building is the headquarters of the Antimafia’s investigative police department.
Another historic street, parallel to Via Giulia and starting from Piazza Farnese, is Via di Monserrato (7), with many tall and narrow buildings, most of which date back to the 16th century or even earlier.
The 14th-century house of St. Catherine of Siena (8) attracts attention more than any other with its typical medieval appearance. However, a plaque above its doorway informs us that this building is an exact copy of the original, where the saint lived, and dates from April 30, 1912.
On a building on the opposite side of the street hangs a plaque, dated 1999, which informs us that 500 years ago this site was the location of the Corte Savella, an infamous courthouse with a prison in the basement. This institution was “notorious” for its brutal treatment of suspects, both during trial and in custody. It was closed after the construction of the aforementioned New Jails. The courthouse was eventually demolished to destroy all traces of this grim institution.
Toward its opposite end, Via di Monserrato comes to the small Piazza dei Ricci (9), where a beautiful 16th century mansion of the same name is located. The facade of Palazzo Ricci is decorated with frescoes, now rather dim, and its rear side faces Via Giulia.
However, the building is remembered not so much for its belonging to the Ricci family as for the fact that, according to slanderers, Pope Paul III met there with his daughter Constanza Farnese, with whom he is said to have had an incestuous relationship. There is no historical evidence of such a relationship between them, but the daughter had so much influence on the pope that the writer and poet of the 16th century Pietro Aretino accused the latter of being “both father and grandfather to his daughter’s children”. 200 years later, such rumors were still circulating, and Pope Benedict XIV humorously said of his predecessor: “His love for his family was exorbitant”.
At the opposite corner of the building, on the Via Giulia, begins the alley leading to the Tiber, Sant’Eligio. At its bend is the church of Sant’Eligio degli Orefici (10), painted by Raphael in 1516 for the guild of goldsmiths, as its beautiful hemispherical dome amply testifies.
At the corner of Vicolo del Polverone and Via Capo di Ferro is another important and richly decorated building with a facade decorated with friezes and statues of famous personalities of ancient Rome, the Palazzo Spada (11). The mansion was built for Cardinal Capo di Ferro in 1540 and a century later was bought by another cardinal, Bernardino Spada, who commissioned Francesco Borromini to enlarge and renovate the building. It now houses a significant collection of Renaissance and Baroque paintings, the Galleria Spada.
The palace is particularly famous for the passage opened by Borromini. The actual length of this passage is 9 meters, but the effect of optical perspective makes it appear four times longer. Another consequence of this effect is that a person standing at the lower end of the passage appears to be a giant. Baroque architects knew how to please their clients by combining originality with technical skill and scientific knowledge. Borromini was indeed assisted in the creation of this passage by an eminent mathematician.
Opposite the mansion, across the Piazza Capo di Ferro, is a pretty fountain by the same Borromini. The fountain consists of a niche with a nymph above an antique sarcophagus. The niche is decorated with fake masonry, a typical “theatricality” of the Baroque style.
From the right side of the square flows the small alley Vicolo delle Grotte. It is famous for being the 18th century brothel where the famous esotericist Giuseppe Balsamo, Count Cagliostro, met his future wife Lorenza. And in the 10th house on this lane was born popular movie actor Aldo Fabrizi, which is commemorated by a plaque.
To the right of Palazzo Spada, at the end of the left side of Via Capo di Ferro is a house with bare brickwork at ground level. Built into the rough wall of the building are antique columns, an architectural device very common in the Middle Ages. Turning left behind the building and passing under the archway along Via dell’Arco del Monte, we arrive at Piazza del Monte di Pieta, on which stands the palazzo of the same name (its other name is Palazzo del Oro). This is Rome’s main pawnshop, founded as a public institution back in 1539 to prevent numerous cases of usury.
People in need of money could get a loan here by mortgaging their personal belongings. It was possible to redeem the pledged items by repaying the loan without interest. The pawnshop was run by the religious community and its capital was raised through alms and charity. It was very successful, and a few decades later the pawnshop had to be enlarged, using part of the building on the northwest side of the square, where the Barberini family lived until 1635. The link to the main building of the pawnshop, whose facade is decorated with a fountain from the early 17th century, was provided by the aforementioned arch.
The establishment was originally established in Via dei Banchi Vecchi (at the northernmost end of the neighborhood). In 1585 it was moved to Via dei Coronari, but in 1604 Pope Clement VIII returned the pawnshop to the Regola neighborhood, to its present location. The coat of arms of the Aldobrandini family, located on the façade of the building, refers to this pontiff.
Since the vaults were absolutely protected by thick bars on the windows (they are still in place) and constant surveillance by Swiss guards specially appointed for this service, the pawnshop began to operate also as a deposit bank, where money and valuables could be kept. Its activities continued even after the fall of the papal state. Even at the end of the 20th century, it was common for Romans to pawn their valuables in Monte di Pietà before leaving for summer vacations (it was much more expensive to rent a safe) and redeem them on their return.
Nearby, at the end of Via Santa Maria in Monticelli, named after a small medieval church, is an interesting complex of 13th-century buildings known as the “houses of St. Paul” (15) because of the popular belief that the apostle lived here.
Next to this complex is the large building of the Ministry of Justice (16), built between 1914 and 1932, designed by Pio Piacentini.
Its façade faces Via Arenula, behind which lies the small Piazza dei Cenci. Here, on the border with the district of Sant’Angelo, stands Palazzetto Cenci (17), built in the mid-16th century on the ruins of a medieval fortress. In this mansion was born and raised Beatrice Cenci, whose dark story is now part of Rome’s history.
