The church and its adjoining monastery traditionally originated in connection with the Iconoclastic controversy within the Byzantine Empire, when some Basilian nuns fled from Constantinople to Rome in the 8th century.

The 16th century church was completely rebuilt according to the wishes of abbess Maria Olimpia Pani, to plans by Giovanni Antonio De Rossi.

During excavations in 1777 as part of expanding the convent a column was discovered - this was re-erected in 1856 in the Piazza di Spagna as the base for a statue of the Virgin of the Immaculate Conception, in commemoration of that belief being proclaimed a dogma by pope Pius IX.

It reopened to the public in 1816 and now holds services according to the Syrian-Antioch rite, as the national church for Syria and the seat of the procurator to the Holy See for the Syrian Catholic Patriarchate of Antioch.

In front of the church's facade is the internal courtyard of the monastery, at the side of piazza Campo Marzio and entered via a three-arched portico.