Tourist Attractions & Monuments Italy

Two small rooms display all the impressions of stamps, coins, commemorative medals of the Vatican City State since its creation, and others older.

The numismatic section presents drawings, plasters, dies necessary for the production of coins and medals. The philatelic section presents a collection of stamps from the Pontifical States, and some preparatory drawings for printing. There is also a Vatican post office.

Did you know that Italy was Europe's leading rice producer? And did you know that Piedmont, and more specifically the area around the town of Verceil (or Vercelli), was the heart of this production? Just an hour's drive south of Lake Orta, you'll find more than 110,000 hectares of rice paddies (perfect for making risotto), creating beautiful, wet, rural landscapes. We'd like to encourage you to explore this beautiful region... and try a dish of rice!

This wing was built under Pius VII and inaugurated in 1817. It houses Roman statues and mosaics, some of which are copies of Greek statues. In the alcove we will seethestatue of the Nile. The river is depicted as a mature and bearded man, surrounded by crocodiles and sixteen naked children who symbolize the bends that the Nile must reach to flood agricultural land. This statue was found in Rome in 1513. Opposite, two gilded bronze peacocks come from Hadrian's villa in Tivoli. Their copy surrounds the Pigne, in the courtyard.

The Candelabra Gallery was refurbished under Pius VI. Its 80 m length is divided into 6 arcades where antiquities from the classical Roman period to the 2nd century are displayed. Under the pilasters rise marble candelabra. We will also look at the ceilings and glasses of the six bays designed by Domenico Torti and Ludwig Seitz under Leo XIII. Notice among all the statues, the curious one of the Artemis Ephesus: covered with what looks like breasts (and which in reality are bull's testicles), it symbolizes fertility.

Gallery of Saint Pius V. This little gallery exhibits tapestries. Admire the ceilings decorated with representations of the Evangelists and Doctors of the Church, painted by Giorgio Vasari and Jacopo Zucchi.

Sobieski Hall. This room, which is part of the apartments of Pius V, takes its name from the painting that decorates the main wall, by the Polish painter Jan Matejko (1883). It shows John III Sobieski, King of Poland, defeating the Turks against the ramparts of Vienna, which was besieged in 1683.

Standing just a few metres from the church of Santa Maria di Castello, this beautiful tower, set between other buildings, belonged to the powerful Embriaci family. It is the only tower to have escaped the ordinance of 1296, which imposed a reduction in the height of all buildings in the city: most probably thanks to a favor granted to the Embriaci family for their many loyal services to the Republic. 41 m high, its rusticated surface is covered with exposed stone and its top is crowned with arches.