Built between 298 and
306 AD., the Baths of Diocletian were the most imposing
of Imperial Roma, able to house double the number of
users compared to the sumptuous building begun by
Caracalla about eighty years before. It is still
possible to assess the size of the entire complex - that
source said were decorated with 3,000 baths - taking
into account that its external perimeter is marked, to
the south west, by the exedra formed of 19th century
buildings at the Via Nazionale end and, further to the
north by the hall transformed into the church of St.
Bernard.
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Beyond the ex Carthusian convent,
the central area houses public offices, the Teaching Faculty,
the ex planetarium and the premises of the National Roman
Museum (The ex Museum ofthe Baths, formed in 1889) whose
important collections of antiquity have been, in part, moved
to the nearby, new home of Massimo Palace and to the Altemps
Palace. The old project by Urban II for the transformation
of the central area of the old Baths of Diocletian into a
place of worship was re-proposed in 1541 and confirmed with
the bull by Julius III on the 10th August, 1550, but then
abandoned. |
With respect to the new
artery marked out by Pi us IV, the Strada Pia; in 1561, the
pontiff commissioned Michelangelo to complete the building,
placed under the patronage of Cardinal Carlo Borromeo and in
the meantime given over to the Carthusians who were given
the honour of constructing the annexed convent. Limiting the
modifications and, therefore, the expense, the works began
again two years later and were completed in 1565. Respecting
the original axis of the imposing baths building and using
the tepidarium as a vestibule (originally with a dome and
lantern), the image of the new church built over the pagan
remains would appear as a sign of the strong religious
contents, marked by the monumental transept vaults held up
by the eight enormous red granite columns and by the deep
rectangular choir imposed by liturgical needs and enlarged
in the second half of the 18th century. |
