Visit Castel Sant'Angelo and Villa Farnesina in Rome: archaeology, history, stunning frescoes, and tales of love and lust of popes and emperors
Discover breathtaking views, luxury and power of popes and bankers from Castel Sant'Angelo to Villa Farnesina
Enter the most authentic Rome, usually denied to tourists, visiting with us Castel Sant'Angelo and Villa Farnesina nearby the St. Peter's Basilica and the Vatican Palaces.
Explore in our tour the various levels of the gigantic bulwark on the Tiber, Castel Sant'Angelo, starting from the Mausoleum of Hadrian with the burial chamber till the level of the mighty fortifications led by the medieval popes to transform into an impregnable stronghold.
Let yourself be seduced by the Renaissance taste for beauty in the lavish rooftop where the Renaissance popes enjoyed wonderful views - don't forget your camera - and non-negligible earthly pleasures.
Villa Farnesina is a surprisingly preserved Renaissance oasis: the spacious and elegant rooms with vast frescoes on the vaults - the Loggia of Galatea painted by Raphael is just one of the masterpieces - are setting where Agostino Chigi - the wealtier European banker in the 500' - gathered his friends, members of the high society and the pope for his legendary banquets.
Duration
3 hours
TOUR INCLUDES
- Licensed guide with degree in archaeology, history or art history
- Skip the line tickets to Castel Sant'Angelo and Villa Farnesina
Main sites Explored in the Tour
- In Castel Sant'Angelo:
- The burial chamber inside the Mausoleum of Emperor Hadrian (Castel Sant'Angelo 1st level )
- The Courtyard of the Angel the and the Courtyard Executions (Castel Sant'Angelo intermediate levels)
- The luxurious Renaissance rooms some frescoed (Castel Sant'Angelo upper levels)
- The circular porch with panoramic views (Castel Sant'Angelo upper levels)
- Unbeatable panoramic view over Rome in Piazza San Pietro form the Terrace of the Angel (top level)
- In Villa Farnesina
- Loggia di Galatea with fresco painted by Raphael
- Loggia di Amore e Psiche with vault frescoes
- Sala delle Nozze fully frescoed
- Room of the Propettives with optical illusions
Wonders discovered
Opening hours and Entry Tickets for this tour
Castel Sant'Angelo is open from Tuesday to Sunday from .... to .....
Villa Farnesina
Famous people's stories
- The banker Agostino Chigi, his career in high finance and the women of his life, up to the great love with Francesca
- Pope Borgia and the bankruptcy of the Holy See, avoided by the financial intervention of Agotino Chigi
- Many Renaissance popes including Pope Paul III Farnese
- The tragic story of Beatrice Cenci, imprisoned in Castel Sant'Angelo and finally beheaded in the square in front, that aroused clamor and indignation not only in Rome
A visit to the disruptive architecture of Castel Sant'Angelo, a giant sitting on the banks of the Tiber, is a must for Rome enthusiastic: it has been continuously inhabited for almost 2000 years of history, and it shows surprising evidences of the transformations suffered.
Delve into its bowels, reach the internal burial chamber of the Mausoleum built by Emperor Hadrian in the II century A.D. for its ashes placed in the heart of the structure (which obviously no one had access to for centuries). Reach the upper levels, discover how the popes of the Middle Ages made a fortified stronghold, quickly reachable in cases of danger from the Vatican Palaces through the famous elevated corridor, the Passetto.
Go up to the rooms - some finely frescoed - of the attic, built for the Renaissance popes by the best architects of the time. But the castle was also the place of torture and death, from prisons to the Shooting Court, where atrocious executions took place.
The last destination is the Terrace of the Angel with an incomparable view of the Vatican and Rome.
Villa Farnesina is one of the hidden gems of Rome, one of the most beautiful and best-preserved Renaissance villas in Italy: upon entering you'll have the impression of going back in time as if the original owners are in the next room.
Discover in our tour its elegant architecture, with high and elegantly decorated ceilings. Here worked the greatest artists of the Renaissance, including Raphael, the author of the fresco of the mythical nymph Galatea that you can admire in the Loggia of Galatea.
Get to know the banker Agostino Chigi, the wealthiest one in Europe at the beginning of the 16th century, known as the banker of the popes for his substantial funding to the Holy See, who commissioned the construction of Villa Farnesina, and who lived there with his beloved Francesca, the beautiful courtesan of humble origins. The Villa Farnesina became the setting of their sumptuous wedding - the most famous of the century, a splendour of gold and silver, in the presence of artists, princes and cardinals of that time, including the pope - celebrated in the Loggia of Cupid and Psyche, whose fresco represents the great history of love of antiquity, a kind of ancient Cinderella.
At the end of the tour, you will get a new perception of history and its tortuous paths which connect the past with the present, that’s a point of arrival and of transit for the future.
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