Rome is definitely the city of a thousand unexpected surprises. I often advise my tourists, during some tour (especially walks in the historic center), to observe carefully, as something surprising could be hidden behind every door or door. An example? It is the internal courtyard of Palazzo Mattei di Giove, a residential and princely building dating back to the last years of the sixteenth century! A good example of how in Rome you can just enter through some anonymous entrances to be catapulted into another time. A local tour guide can help you discover even the most hidden corners of Rome.

This palace was part of the so-called Isola Mattei, a group of palaces and various buildings, built close to the old Jewish Ghetto, which were owned by a single family: the Mattei one. It was a very powerful clan in the Rome of that time, famous for its possessions and for its extraordinary and vast ancient Greek-Roman art collection. An exponent of the family, Asdrubale Mattei (whose name we still see depicted on the jamb of one of the entrances, the one towards Via Caetani), at the 1598 commissioned the to architect Carlo Maderno to build a new residence, capable above all of hosting the his beloved collection. From here we understand how a noble family of thattime loved to exhibit the treasures, in particular from the Roman age, in their possession. A way to reaffirm their social status, but also to always be surrounded by those artifacts that a family of high lineage, and with a certain education, considered beautiful and perfect. And from this hidden courtyard we can see the wealth of the Mattei family!

Despite various transfers (today part of the Mattei collection is in the Vatican Museums), we are still surrounded, entering this courtyard, by marble busts and statues depicting divinities, heroes and politicians of the Republic of Rome. Sarcophagi and various marble slabs, decorated with bas-reliefs with mythological and mythical subjects, are displayed on the walls. A little taste of the opulence of a Renaissance family, who wanted to show right from the entrance what made them proud. But even inside, when it is possible to access, one is dazzled by the galleries and the frescoed rooms, always at the beginning of the seventeenth century, by some of the greatest masters of the time, such as Pietro da Cortona, Pomarancio or Lanfranco, just to have an idea.