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14th rione of Rome, Italy
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Borgo (sometimes called also I Borghi) is the 14th rione (administrative district) of Rome, Italy. It is identified by the initials R. XIV and is included within Municipio I.
Its coat of arms shows a lion (after the name "Leonine City", which was also given to the district), lying in front of three mounts and a star. These – together with a lion rampant – are also part of the coat of arms of Pope Sixtus V, who annexed Borgo as the 14th rione of Rome.
During the Roman age, the Borgo district was part of the 14th Regio (Regio XIV Transtiberim) and was named Ager Vaticanus, after the auguries (vaticinii) performed there by the Etruscan Augurs. Since it lay outside the Pomerium (the religious city border inside which burial was forbidden) and was plagued by malaria, this territory was used as a burial place. Some tombs reached notable proportions, including the Terebinthus Neronis, which was a round tomb surmounted by a narrow tower, and the Meta Romuli, a pyramid similar to that still standing near Porta San Paolo) that was demolished only in 1499.
At the foot of the Vatican Hill, two roads started: the Via Cornelia, which joined the Via Aurelia near Tarquinii, and the Via Triumphalis (Triumphal Road), which met the Via Cassia a few kilometers north. The latter was so named because, beginning with Titus, the Roman Emperors used it to enter the city when celebrating their Triumphs.
At the beginning of the Imperial Age, magnificent Villae (country houses) and Horti (Gardens), such as those owned by Agrippina the Elder, wife of Germanicus and mother of Caligula (Horti Agrippinae), and by Domitia Longina, wife of Domitianus (Horti Domitiae), were built near the slopes of the Gianicolo and Vatican hills.
Emperor Gaius (also known as Caligula) built on the Vatican a circus (Circus Gaianus), which was then enlarged by Nero (Circus Neronis). The obelisk standing today in St. Peter's Square was erected along its raised median (the spina). The circus was connected to the city through an archway (Porticus). Nero also replaced the timber bridge of the Via Triumphalis with a stone bridge, (whose ruins can still be seen in the Tiber during the minimum flow periods) named after him Pons Neronianus or Triumphalis. Emperor Hadrian built near the Tiber his huge Mausoleum, which he connected to the left bank of the river with another Bridge, the Pons Ælius (today's Ponte Sant'Angelo).
But what changed forever the destiny of the zone was the martyrdom of St. Peter at the foot of the Vatican hill in 67, during the first persecution of the Christians. The saint was buried nearby, and this turned the Vatican into a place of pilgrimage. Above the tomb of the saint, Pope Anacletus built an oratory, which in 324 Emperor Constantine turned into a huge basilica devoted to the prince of the Apostles. This church, known today as Old Saint Peter's, soon became (until its destruction in the 16th century, when the new Saint Peter's was erected in its place) one of the centers of Christianity.
During the early Middle Ages the bridge of Nero fell into ruins, while the Mausoleum of Hadrian was converted into a stronghold (Castel Sant'Angelo), the possession of which ensured control of the city. Despite the wars and invasions that plagued Rome during those centuries, the flood of pilgrims to the tomb of the apostle never stopped. Pilgrims of the same nationality gathered together in associations named Scholae, whose task was to host and to aid men and women of the same nation coming to Rome. The most famous were those of the Franks, Saxons, Frisians and Lombards. Each Schola had its own hospice and church. One of the first – the Schola Saxonum - was built during the 8th century by Ina or Ine, king of the West Saxons. That hospice became the core of the future Hospital of Santo Spirito, one of the oldest and largest in Rome, founded by Pope Innocent III in 1198. Near the hospital was erected the church of Santo Spirito in Sassia. The German pilgrims gave the zone around their Scholae the name Burg (fortified town), which, italianised, became the name of the quarter.
Since it lay outside Aurelian's Walls, the Borgo was always exposed to attacks. During the 8th and 9th centuries, the quarter – together with the basilica - was plundered several times by Saracens who landed in Portus, and devastated by fires (that of 847 was immortalised by Raphael in a fresco painted in the stanze vaticane).
Finally, Pope Leo IV built the walls which still bear his name. On June 27, 852 the Pope, accompanied by the clergy and people, started this undertaking walking bare-foot along the circuit of the new walls. Then, in order to augment the population, Pope Leo settled several families of Corsicans in the Borgo. Since that time, the quarter was no longer considered a part of Rome, but a separate town, the Leonine City (Civitas Leonina), with its own magistrates and governor. It was only in 1586, under Pope Sixtus V, that the Borgo, as fourteenth rione, became again a part of Rome. The Leonine walls, which incorporated an older wall built by Totila during the Gothic War, still exist between the Vatican and the Castle, where they bear the name of Passetto. This constitutes a covered passage, which could be used – and actually has been used several times - by the Pope as an escape route from his residence to the Castle in case of danger.
In the Middle Ages, the quarter was not much populated, with sparse houses, some churches and a lot of vegetable gardens. There were also several brick furnaces, using the clay abundant in the Vatican and Gianicolo hills. A small harbor, the Porto Leonino, later used to deliver the travertine blocks needed to build the new Saint Peter's, existed south of the castle.
The pilgrims going to St. Peter's and coming from the left bank through Ponte Sant'Angelo, after entering a gate (later named Porta Castello) could walk through the Borgo of the Saxons (today's Borgo Santo Spirito) or the Porticus or Portica (named now Porticus Sancti Petri), which was still in place. Those coming from Trastevere along the route that would later become Via della Lungara used the posterula Saxonum (today's Porta Santo Spirito), and, finally, the pilgrims coming from the north (monte Mario) following the Via Francigena, entered through Porta San Pellegrino (also named Viridaria because of its vicinity to the Vatican Gardens).
In his Divine Comedy, Dante describes the great crowds of pilgrims visiting the Leonine City during the first Jubilee, which took place in 1300 under Boniface VIII.
During the Avignon Papacy the Borgo, together with Rome, suffered decay. The Portica collapsed, and on its place was built the road of Borgo Vecchio, also named Carriera Martyrum after the martyrs going to death in the Circus of Nero. During that time only Borgo Santo Spirito and Borgo Vecchio afforded access to reach Saint Peter's from the left bank.
The recovery began with the end of the Western Schism and the beginning of the Renaissance. By that time, the center of gravity of Rome began to shift from the zone around Campidoglio, where medieval Rome had developed, to the Campo Marzio plain. At the same time, the Popes abandoned finally the Lateran complex for the Vatican, which now became the new center of power in Rome. The large amount of building activity and above all the rebuilding of Saint Peter, which was the ultimate result of this translocation, attracted several artists to the Borgo, while the renewed flood of pilgrims boosted commerce.
Under Nicholas V, Bernardo Rossellino planned three diverging roads with arcades going to Saint Peter, but the Pontiff's death blocked the project. Sixtus IV opened a new road parallel to the Passetto, named after him via Sistina (later Borgo Sant'Angelo).
Magnificent buildings were built at the beginning of the 16th century by high prelates and aristocrats, including Palazzo Branconio dell'Aquila, designed by Raphael; the Palazzo Caprini by Donato Bramante (a house that Raphael chose to buy, and later became part of the Palazzo dei Convertendi); Palazzo Castellesi, built by Cardinal Adriano Castellesi, attributed to Andrea Bregno or Bramante and a small-scale copy of the Palazzo della Cancelleria, and Palazzo dei Penitenzieri, perhaps designed by of Baccio Pontelli. The last three palaces faced a small square, Piazza del Cardinale di S. Clemente (later Piazza Scossacavalli), which became the most important in the Borgo.
Also wealthy bourgeoises, such as Febo Brigotti and Jacopo da Brescia, the doctors respectively of Paul III and Leo X, had their houses built in the Borgo.
The Leonine City at that time was also renowned in Rome for its stufe. These buildings, whose tradition came from Germany (the name comes from the German word stube), were something between a Roman bath and a modern sauna, and were often attended by artists, who could freely sketch nudes there (Raffaello himself was owner of a stufa in Borgo, near his palace).
In order to address the traffic problems in the bustling Borgo, a new road, the Via Alexandrina or Recta, later named Borgo Nuovo, was opened during the Jubilee of 1500 by Pope Alexander VI Borgia was opened between Castel Sant'Angelo and Saint Peter's Square. The Borgo Nuovo paralleled to the north the existing road of Borgo Vecchio, creating a distinct row of houses between these two roads formed the so-called "spina" (named thus on account of its similarity to the dividing line of an ancient Roman Circus). At about its middle, the spina was interrupted by a small square, called Piazza Scossacavalli. A recurrent theme of Roman city planning, were the various projects contemplating the demolition of the spina: starting with, that of Carlo Fontana in the late 17th century; and ending, in 1936, when, under Benito Mussolini and Pius XI, this task was finally accomplished to create the wide Via della Conciliazione in the space between the form Borgo Nouvo and Borgo Vecchio.
The golden Age of the Borgo reached its apogee during the reign of the two Florentine Popes, Leo X and Clement VII, both members of the Medici family. Under the latter, the quarter had a population of 4,926 inhabitants, almost all bachelors and non-Roman. Nine out of the twenty five Cardinals belonging to the Curia, each of whom maintained a court comprising hundreds of people, were living here. The most important artists (such as Raphael) took or built their houses in the Borgo. The only important female presence was that of the so-called Cortigiane, decent prostitutes, who were the lovers of high prelates and noblemen.
All this came to an abrupt end on May 6, 1527, when the soldiers of Charles V entered the Leonine City and mercilessly plundered it, so starting the Sack of Rome. Clement VII barely escaped capture, running through the elevated Passetto (one block north of the spina) in his night dress and locking himself within Castel Sant'Angelo, while all the Swiss Guards, except those defending his escape, were killed near the obelisk.
Despite this disaster, the quarter was able to recover quite quickly. Paul III restored the walls, erecting three new ramparts and the still unfinished Porta Santo Spirito (the work of Antonio da Sangallo the younger). The Borgo continued to grow to such an extent, that in 1565 Pius IV started the construction of three new roads, all north of the Passetto, named respectively Borgo Pio (after himself), Borgo Vittorio (after the victory of Lepanto) and Borgo Angelico (after Angelo, his own first name prior to his election). In order to boost the new settlement, he gave tax privileges to the Romans who choose to build their houses here. New Walls, and a new monumental gate (Porta Angelica), were built to protect the new area, which in honor of the Pope was named Civitas Pia. Pius IV also demolished several old churches and monasteries: among these, in 1564, the old Church of Santa Maria in Traspontina, which lay directly next to the Castle. A new church bearing the same name was built in 1587 in the middle of Borgo Nuovo.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Borgo (rione of Rome)”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.