Take a break from the tourist crowd in central Rome and wander this characterful place across the Tiber river. Here is Your Local’s Guide to Rome’s Trastevere.
Go there and wonder Its charming narrow streets and tight little square: this is the place for poets and artists.
Trastevere was for long a working-class area: now has become trendy and alternative, full of great bars and restaurants and wonderfully lively in the evening.
Many visitors feel that Trastevere offers them a glimpse of ‘real Romans’, far from the tourist magnets elsewhere in the city.
The “Magic” of a night in Trastevere.
CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=266177
A famous church: Santa Maria in Trastevere
Be sure to visit the majestic church of Santa Maria in Trastevere when you’re there.
One of Rome’s oldest church sites, this Basilica was built here in the fourth century. It is said to have been the first church in Rome dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
By philippos – Eigene Lichtbildarbeit, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15591978
One of the most interesting aspects of the architecture is the gilded wooden ceiling covered in glowing golden mosaics that are so intricately detailed you would think they were paintings rather than perfect assemblages of tiny pieces of gold, glass and stone.
Visitors can witness the Assumption of the Virgin, created in 1616 by Domenichino, and a 12th-century mosaic of Jesus and the Virgin Mary.
This ceiling is such a work of art that many visitors have reported making more than one trip to the Basilica just to view it in all its splendour again.
Out front of Piazza di Santa Maria, an impressive 17th-century fountain stands in the same place where locals have been drawing water since Ancient Roman times.
The Basilica visit is free and it is open daily from 7.30 am to 9:00 pm.
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