Italia Lodging - Bed and breakfast in Italy

Italia Lodging - Bed and breakfast in Italy
Charming small hotels in Italy and useful information for your Italian holiday

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Wednesday, November 06, 2013

A hidden treasure in Rome right behind the Pantheon

Right behind the Pantheon, missed by the most of distracted tourists, a small tresure is hold in Rome in a small square called Piazza della Minerva. Cosidered the Bernini's most original invention, a small elephant (“Elefantino”) serves as the support of an Egyptian obelisk right in front of the only Gotic church in Rome called Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, a church that, with its electric blue vaulting, keeps other treasures like the Michelangelo's Cristo Risorto (Christ Bearing the Cross).


At the base of the elephant statue, which is definitely too small in relation to the size of the obelisk which is supporting, a latin inscription says: “Robustae mentis esse solidam sapientiam sustinere”, saying to everybody that the elephant is the symbol of the “strong mind”, which is the only condition to bear a “great wisdom”.

Enjoy this secret corner of Rome.

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