Italy: Rome, St. Peter's Square & Borghese Gallery: 5 of 12

As I started my research on this segment of our astounding tour, I discovered that this frame (below), in music terms, has been "covered"... over and over and over. Same exact framing, different butts... OK maybe not everyone had a bald guy in the frame. But a humbling discovery:

But our target (Sistine Chapel) is beckoning, and we'll soon travel that hallway to the left (above).

That hallway, part of the Vatican Museums, leads to the Sistine Chapel. There's a security checkpoint at the entrance, and my reconstructed knee merited a sidelining and wanding, just like an airport protocol.

So as with most things Roman, there's a line, but with Tauk, there's a way through the clutter. Time and time again, we were learning, it pays to have pros in charge. We weren't able to see everything we were slated to see due to the Pope's death, but we got to see a lot, and didn't suffer the oft-denounced wait times (sometimes three or four hours, we heard). So here's the view enroute, depicting Nero's golden home, Domus Aurea:

The unedited original frame was more golden, glowing as it were, but a little editing brought out the colors and definition. Stunning.

The passageway is filled with incredible works of art. One example, Artemus of Ephesus (Diana):

And since we're in the middle of some of the most precious art ever collected, why not have a lapis lazuli installation in the floor? (not for us to walk on, but...):

Moving closer to the Sistine, this would have been a wonderful painting... if one can say that of such a horrific event. But indeed, this is a shot of a tapestry depicting the Massacre of the Innocents:

And closer to the Chapel, this tapestry... huge. And incredible. And I was in such a rush the subject (Jesus emerging from the tomb) didn't dawn on me until back in the "darkroom":

And these are not even the Raphael tapestries, which are in the Sistine Chapel proper... for a limited time only, so it seems.

But let's move closer to the Chapel... via the Galleria of Maps:

Enroute, we saw this map, astonishingly accurate as it was completed in 1580:

And, at last, we entered the Sistine Chapel:

So, a little step back before we go outside with some thoughts from Linda's notes:

"Didn’t know Nero started the fire in Rome to blame the Christians and start prosecution.

St Peter’s square. Couldn’t get to walk on the square or get any closer to the Vatican. Structures already set up and more being constructed for the funeral and waiting for the conclave. Saw 2 Cardinals in different places being interviewed (or at least followed) by the press. Cameras all around (professionals). Soldiers in uniforms from several countries are seen with machine guns. Someone said the larger guns were for drones."

Steve adds: "I heard the larger guns were actually shockwave generators... in their trials, people were unable to move when hit, but had no long-term issues...thus perfect to take down drones."

To continue on with this most intellectually and artistically exhausting day, we went out to St. Peter's Square:

The Pope lives here... the three-story building perched on high - he waves from the third floor window, second from right on the facade facing the camera:

(note the video monitor, large screen with test pattern, lower left)

The group moving to enter? Dignitaries? High rollers? I have no clue.

And here's a wide shot of the square, note the double fencing:

And last but not least, some street flavor - a video panning the square with our guide's voice and our esteemed tour group, all except three of us:

Link to YouTube video shot Thursday, Apr 24, 2025

But wait! There's more! The title of this post does include the phrase "Borghese Gallery", for which we had a private evening tour.

Imagine. No crowd. Just one impassioned guide (who clearly loved to show and tell - what great passion).

First up, fittingly, Bacchus... or Dionysus: god of wine, vegetation, fertility, ritual madness (?), theatre...

In the entry hall to the Gallery, this sculpture (below) was an integrative restoration... that is, an ancient horse in relief discovered at a villa in Tivoli, to which was added the figure of Marcus Curzio (Curtius), a young hero flinging himself and his horse into an abyss (a fissure that had opened during an earthquake) in order to save Rome. The work was completed by one Pietro Bernini in 1617:

And this sculpture hardly needs anything written at all... David:

San Girolamo, Saint Jerome, by Caravaggio:

Aeneas carries his father and leads his son, as described by Virgil in the second book of the Aeneid, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1619:

And a series of three frames, needed to tell the story of the genius of Gian Lorenzo Bernini... first, the entire work, frontal... the Rape of Persephone:

Next, the detail showing her expression of horror and fright:

And last, a reveal of Pluto's hand sinking into her flesh as he drags her to the underworld... note the detail in both his hand and the undulation of her skin:

Titian, Sacred and Profane Love:

And a great story, noted by Linda, is of a Raphael painting forcibly acquired by a gang working for Cardinal Scipione Borghese, nephew of Pope Paul V... so it became part of the family collection, in 1608. Behold, The Deposition, or Entombment of Christ: