Palazzo Borghese is a palace in

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

, Italy, the main seat of the

Borghese family The House of Borghese ( , ) is a family of Italian noble and papal background, originating as the Borghese or Borghesi in Siena, where they came to prominence in the 13th century and held offices under the '' commune''. During the 16th century, t ...

. It was nicknamed ''il Cembalo'' ("the

harpsichord A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a musical keyboard, keyboard. Depressing a key raises its back end within the instrument, which in turn raises a mechanism with a small plectrum made from quill or plastic that plucks one ...

") due to its unusual trapezoidal groundplan; its narrowest facade faces the River

Tiber The Tiber ( ; ; ) is the List of rivers of Italy, third-longest river in Italy and the longest in Central Italy, rising in the Apennine Mountains in Emilia-Romagna and flowing through Tuscany, Umbria, and Lazio, where it is joined by the R ...

. The entrance at the opposite end of the building, the "keyboard" of the cembalo, faces onto the Fontanella di Borghese, with another in a great flanking facade to the Piazza Borghese that is extended by a slightly angled facade leading down Via Borghese towards the river. Both these entrances lead into a large courtyard on one side of which is a two level open arcade, with paired Doric and Ionic columns, that frames the garden beyond. The first floor of the palace is the seat of the Embassy of Spain in

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

since 1947.

History

The architectural historian

Howard Hibbard Benjamin Howard Hibbard, Jr. (May 23, 1928 – October 29, 1984) was an American art historian and educator. Hibbard was Professor of Italian Baroque Art at Columbia University. Career A native of Madison, Hibbard was born to Margaret and Benja ...

has demonstrated that the nine-bay section of the palace on Piazza Fontanella Borghese was begun in 1560/61 for Monsignor Tommaso del Giglio, whose coat of arms or ''stemma'' remain over the door in Piazza Borghese, and he suggests that the architect was

Vignola Vignola (; Emilian language#Dialects, Modenese: ; Bolognese dialect, Bolognese: ) is a city and ''comune'' in the province of Modena (Emilia-Romagna), Italy. Its economy is based on agriculture, especially fruit farming, but there are also mecha ...

, an attribution accepted by

Anthony Blunt Anthony Frederick Blunt (26 September 1907 – 26 March 1983), (formerly styled Sir Anthony Blunt from 1956 until November 1979), was a leading British art historian and a Soviet spy. Blunt was a professor of art history at the University ...

, considered conclusive by James S. Ackerman and followed by other scholars since, with more or less reduced interventions by Longhi. Before Tomasso del Giglio died in 1578, the façade and the unique but undocumented double-columned two-storey arcade of the courtyard had been established, a conceptual scheme of Vignola's, Hibbard suggested, but which was carried out in 1575-78 by

Martino Longhi the Elder Martino Longhi the Elder (1534–1591) was an Italian architect, the father of Onorio Longhi and the grandfather of Martino Longhi the Younger. He is also known as ''Martino Lunghi''. He was born in Viggiù into a family of architects, and initial ...

. Longhi was retained by Pedro Cardinal Deza, who bought the property in 1587, but seems to have done little more than continue the great courtyard. Cardinal Camillo Borghese purchased the structure in 1604 and acquired further adjacent properties towards the river. When the Cardinal became

Pope Paul V Pope Paul V (; ) (17 September 1552 – 28 January 1621), born Camillo Borghese, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 16 May 1605 to his death, in January 1621. In 1611, he honored Galileo Galilei as a mem ...

in 1605, he gave the palace to his brothers but continued to commission the work, which was carried forward vigorously, at first by

Flaminio Ponzio Flaminio Ponzio (1560–1613) was an Italian architect during the late-Renaissance or so-called Mannerist period, serving in Rome as the architect for Pope Paul V. Ponzio was born in Viggiù near Varese, and he died in Rome. After juvenile trai ...

, and completed after Ponzio's death in 1613 by

Carlo Maderno Carlo Maderno or Maderna (1556 – 31 January 1629) was an Italian architect, born in today's Ticino, Switzerland, who is remembered as one of the fathers of Baroque architecture. His façades of Santa Susanna, St. Peter's Basilica, and Sant ...

and

Giovanni Vasanzio Giovanni Vasanzio or Jan van Santen (1550 – 21 August 1621) was a Dutch-born architect, garden designer and engraver who spent his mature career in Rome, where he arrived in the 1580s. Vasanzio was born in Utrecht. He worked as assistant t ...

. Ponzio extended the square courtyard from five to seven bays, and the oval stair between the courtyard and a garden that stretched as far as the Ripetta. He also constructed the secondary facade onto the Piazza Borghese and down towards the Tiber, with balconies above the rusticated entrance on the Via di Ripetta. On the death of his uncle, Cardinal Scipione Borghese took up residence and undertook changing the garden to a loggia and hanging garden. In 1671-76

Carlo Rainaldi Carlo Rainaldi (4 May 1611 – 8 February 1691) was an Italian architect of the Baroque period. Biography Born in Rome, Rainaldi was one of the leading architects of 17th-century Rome, known for a certain grandeur in his designs. He worked at f ...

added new features for Prince Giovan Battista Borghese; the most extensive changes were made on the newly raised ground floor of the long wing extending towards the Tiber, ending with river views, which the Borghese found the most congenial dwelling spaces: Rainaldi added the columnar loggia to Ponzi's end facade (''illustration, right''), and on the interior a richly stuccoed oval chapel, and the narrow barrel-vaulted ''galleria'', the highly charged Cortonesque decorative details of which were designed by Giovan Francesco Grimaldi (1606–1680). The

Porto di Ripetta The Porto di Ripetta was a port in the city of Rome. It was situated on the banks of the River Tiber and was designed and built in 1704 by the Italian Baroque architect Alessandro Specchi. Located in front of the church of San Girolamo degli Sch ...

, the port of Rome, was along the river bank of the Via di Ripetta. From 1707, the Tiber side of Palazzo Borghese would have overlooked the scenographic steps of the Porto di Ripetta designed by

Alessandro Specchi Alessandro Specchi (1668 – 16 November 1729) was an Italian architect and engraver. Biography Born in 1668 in Rome, he trained as an architect under Carlo Fontana. He also specialized as an engraver and made a well known series of plates ...

. The port was destroyed in the 19th century with the development of

Lungotevere Lungotevere (Italian for ''Tiber Waterfront'') is an alley or boulevard running along the river Tiber within the city of Rome. The building of the Lungoteveres required the demolition of the former edifices along the river banks and the constru ...

Overview

The main façades have three stories with two

mezzanines A mezzanine (; or in Italian, a ''mezzanino'') is an intermediate floor in a building which is partly open to the double-height ceilinged floor below, or which does not extend over the whole floorspace of the building, a loft with non-sloped w ...

inserted between them and the two majestic portals are flanked by columns and a balcony. Through the portal on the Piazza Fontanella Borghese, a view across the courtyard is centred on one of the wall fountains in the garden beyond. The edifice has a magnificent inner courtyard, surrounded by ninety-six granite columns and decorated with statues, a

nympheum A ''nymphaeum'' (Latin : ''nymphaea'') or ''nymphaion'' (), in ancient Greece and Ancient Rome, Rome, was a monument sanctuary, consecrated to the nymphs, especially those of Spring (hydrosphere), springs. These monuments were originally natur ...

, and other features, as well as an enclosed garden with three niche wall-fountains built to designs by

Johann Paul Schor Johann Paul Schor (1615 – 1674), known in Rome as Giovanni Paolo Tedesco ( ''Tedesco'' literally means ''German'' in Italian), was an Austrian artist. He was the preeminent designer of decorative arts in Baroque Rome, providing drawings for sta ...

and finished by Rainaldi for Prince Giovan Battista Borghese in 1673.Howard Hibbard, "Palazzo Borghese Studies I: The Garden and Its Fountains" ''The Burlington Magazine'' 100 No. 663 (June 1958), pp. 204-212, 215. The court has been described as "one of the most spectacular existing, not only in Rome". The façade towards the Piazza Fontanella Borghese faces another Borghese palace, rebuilt in the 16th century by

Scipio Borghese Scipione Caffarelli-Borghese (; 1 September 1577 – 2 October 1633) was an Italian cardinal, art collector and patron of the arts. A member of the Borghese family, he was the patron of the painter Caravaggio and the artist Bernini. His legacy ...

to house the lesser members of the family, the stables and the servants. Palazzo Borghese was the original seat of the family's art collection, with works by

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), now generally known in English as Raphael ( , ), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of paintings by Raphael, His work is admired for its cl ...

Titian Tiziano Vecellio (; 27 August 1576), Latinized as Titianus, hence known in English as Titian ( ), was an Italian Renaissance painter, the most important artist of Renaissance Venetian painting. He was born in Pieve di Cadore, near Belluno. Ti ...

and many others, transferred in 1891 to the

Galleria Borghese The or Borghese Gallery is an art gallery in Rome, Italy, housed in the former Villa Borghese Pinciana. At the outset, the gallery building was integrated with its gardens, but nowadays the Villa Borghese gardens are considered a separate touri ...

Villa Borghese Villa Borghese is a landscape garden in Rome, containing a number of buildings, museums (see Galleria Borghese) and attractions. It is the third-largest public park in Rome (80 hectares or 197.7 acres), after the ones of the Villa Doria Pamphil ...

. The balcony scene in the 1968 film ''Romeo and Juliet'' was filmed not at this Palazzo Borghese but at Palazzo Borghese in Artena outside Rome.

Notes

References

* * * *Hibbard, Howard. (1962) ''The Palazzo Borghese'' (Rome: American Academy) Biographies of Longhi and Ponzio are in appendices. *Touring Club Italiano, (1965)''Roma e Dintorni''

External links

Page with ancient print of the palace
{{Authority control Borghese residences

Borghese The House of Borghese ( , ) is a family of Italian noble and papal background, originating as the Borghese or Borghesi in Siena, where they came to prominence in the 13th century and held offices under the '' commune''. During the 16th century, t ...

Houses completed in the 17th century Rome R. IV Campo Marzio Diplomatic missions in Rome Diplomatic missions of Spain Italy–Spain relations