The Portico Which Agrippa Added To The Building, Is
Undoubtedly Very Noble, Though, In My Opinion, It Corresponds But
Ill With The Simplicity Of The Edifice.
With all my veneration
for the antients, I cannot see in what the beauty of tile rotunda
consists.
It is no more than a plain unpierced cylinder, or
circular wall, with two fillets and a cornice, having a vaulted
roof or cupola, open in the centre. I mean the original building,
without considering the vestibule of Agrippa. Within side it has
much the air of a mausoleum. It was this appearance which, in all
probability, suggested the thought to Boniface IV. to transport
hither eight and twenty cart-loads of old rotten bones, dug from
different burying-places, and then dedicate it as a church to the
blessed Virgin and all the holy martyrs. I am not one of those
who think it is well lighted by the hole at the top, which is
about nine and twenty feet in diameter, although the author of
the Grand Tour calls it but nine. The same author says, there is
a descent of eleven steps to go into it; that it is a hundred and
forty-four feet in heighth, and as many in breadth; that it was
covered with copper, which, with the brass nails of the portico,
pope Urban VIII. took away, and converted into the four wreathed
pillars that support the canopy of the high altar in the church
of St. Peter, &c. The truth is, before the time of pope Alexander
VII.
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