Cybo Chapel

For the beauty of its paintings, the preciousness of marble revetments covering its walls and the importance of the artists involved in its construction the chapel is regarded one of the most significant sacral monuments erected in Rome in the last quarter of the 17th century.

[1] The previous chapel on this site was erected by Cardinal Lorenzo Cybo de Mari, nephew of Pope Innocent VIII, and dedicated to St Lawrence.

[3] The very fine funeral monument of Lorenzo Cybo de Mari was transferred to the church of San Cosimato where its fragments are still preserved.

The present chapel was built by Cardinal Alderano Cybo (1613-1700) to glorify the achievements of his family, the dukes of Massa and princes of Carrara.

From the outside the chapel is almost totally hidden by view by the 19th-century extension of the Augustinian monastery except its dome which remains a prominent landmark on Piazza del Popolo.

This lantern has tall semicircular windows, a strongly projecting modillion cornice, and it is crowned with a small, onion shaped cupola, a ball and a cross.

Before the Neo-Classical rebuilding of the monastery by Valadier the chapel had the appearance of a freestanding, central-plan, small church by the side of the basilica behind the wall of its enclosed garden.

The two bronze putti holding up the main altar and the medallion with the relief portrait of Saint Faustina on the martyr's urn are also his works.