Basilica of St. Mary over Minerva

A few meters from the Pantheon, stands the only gothic church in Rome. It was named "Sopra Minerva" since it was built on the foundations of a temple dedicated to Minerva. The construction of this church began in 1280 and was completed in 1370, later on it was renovated by Carlo Maderno, among others, and was brought back to its neo-medieval state in the XIX century; the inside still preserves a collection of medieval and Renaissance tombs. Saint Catherine of Siena (1347 - 1380), patroness of Europe, is buried here with the exception of her head which is in Siena. It was Pope Zacharias (741 - 752) who Christianized the site, who dedicated it to the eastern monks. The Dominican friars still administer the area today, after having received the property from Pope Alexander IV (1254 - 1261). Among the various masterpieces housed in this gorgeous church you can admire the arched vault painted blue with gilded stars, a Christ bearing the Cross carved by Michelangelo (1521), the tomb of Fra Angelico (a monastic painter who died in the adjoining monastery), the tombs-monuments of the Medici Popes Leo X and Clement VII, Filippino Lippi's fresco of the Assumption in the Carafa Chapel. In the same chapel you'll see the tomb of Pope Paul IV, a religious zealot of the Carafa family best known as the Great Inquisitor of the Counter-Reformation. Outside  the church, in the beautiful Piazza della Minerva, the sculpture of a baby elephant carrying a small Egyptian obelisk on his back, was sculptured by Bernini in1667 (the obelisk is of course much older since it was found among the ruins of a temple of Isis that once stood nearby).

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