Palazzo Del Quirinale Guide to the Rooms Open to the Public [Paperback] Peter Spring

Date:

1616–17

Artists:

Giovanni Lanfranco and his workshop; Agostino Tassi and his workshop

Denomination / Type of monument:

Frescoed frieze

Patron(s):

Pope Paul V Borghese

History:

The Sala Regia (Royal Hall) was built by Carlo Maderno during the renovation works promoted by Paolo V Borghese along this wing of the Quirinale Palace, which had been used as papal seat since the end of the 16th century. It was the room where the pope’s public audiences and meetings with foreign ambassadors and delegations visiting Rome were held. The frieze, alluding precisely to those functions and exalting Paul V’s foreign policy – especially with the East and Africa – as well as his missionary activity, was frescoed between 1616 and 1617 by a workshop directed by Agostino Tassi and Giovanni Lanfranco. The first project involved covering the whole wall surface with frescoes, and only at a later time was it decided to limit it only to the upper part, while the lower part would host drapes and tapestries.

Description:

The frescoed frieze is located ten metres above the walking floor and just above the windows. The short side walls show a decoration with allegorical figures inside niches, biblical representations, coats of arms and the heraldic animals of the Borghese family (dragon and eagle).
The frieze of the long walls, on the other hand, depict a loggia framed by Ionic pilasters resting on painted corbels, from which various groups of exotic characters peek over. Between the arches of the loggia there are also square windows and under them the monochrome images of the several buildings erected by Paul V during his pontificate (the Quirinale Palace, the facade of San Pietro, the Mostra dell’Acqua Paola, the Pauline Chapel in Santa Maria Maggiore) accompanied by allegorical figures and Borghese emblems. Between the square windows one can see the ovals with episodes from the Stories of Moses, who, as the legislator of the Old Testament, prefigures the role assumed by Christ and therefore by Peter and the Roman pontiffs as guides of the Christian world. Among the Oriental delegations that look out from the loggia we can recognize the Japanese, led by Hasekura Tsunenaga, which visited Rome in 1615, the two Persian embassies (in Rome in 1609), the Congolese delegation (1608), that of the Armenian Patriarch (1610) and the Ethiopian one sent by the Negus Seltan Sagued. The short sides of the room and the long wall facing Via del Quirinale were almost entirely executed by Giovanni Lanfranco, Carlo Saraceni and assistants; the other long wall is by Agostino Tassi and collaborators. The magnificence of the whole fresco is due to the perfect fusion of allegorical images and symbols with the portraits of representatives of foreign delegations, with their exotic costumes rendered with great accuracy. The psychological analysis of the individual figures is also very remarkable, showing diverse attitudes such as surprise, haughtiness, amusement and lively curiosity.