Italy Traveller Guide

Immediately behind the Palazzo Braschi, just south of Piazza Navona, the small space of Piazza Pasquino isn’t quite what you’d expect from the scene of centuries of satire, but the battered torso of Pasquino itself, anonymous poker of fun at the rich and famous during the Middle Ages, still stands in the corner. It’s most famous among a number of so-called “talking statues” in Rome, upon which anonymous comments on the affairs of the day would be attached - comments that had a serious as well as a humorous intent. Pasquino gave us our word “pasquinade”, but nowadays the graffitied comments and photocopied poems that occasionally grace the statue are usually somewhat absent in wit. Via del Governo Vecchio leads west from here into one of Rome’s liveliest quarters, the narrow streets noisy at night, and holding some of the city’s most vigorous restaurants and bars.