N – Navona

Piazza Navona

The Piazza Navona is a bustling place with diners eating al fresco and tourists wandering around, enjoying the spectacle of the fountains and statues.

Bernini’s Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi (Fountain of the Four Rivers) was built in 1651 and includes the Obelisk of Domitian. Domitian was the third and last emperor of the Flavian dynasty, and the 11th emperor of the Roman Empire. There are two other fountains – the Fontana del Moro and the Fontana del Nettuno.

This is an interesting area. Outside the ‘modern’ piazza are signs of the Stadio di Domiziano (Stadium of Domitian), which occupied this area before the new era brought fountains and sculptures to the city. Excavations have been left visible from the pavement and to the untrained eye you might believe you were just looking at the foundations of the relatively more modern 17th century Sant’Agnese in Agone (also called Sant’Agnese in Piazza Navona). 

Although I didn’t venture inside, I have seen photos of the shrine – and skull – of poor St Agnese. She wasn’t, apparently, in agony – Agone is from the Greek and means ‘in the site of the competitions’ – the stadium being built on a Greek model of a sporting arena.