Piazza Navona

Piazza Navona is the Baroque stage set of Rome. Its long oval shape is no accident: the square follows exactly the footprint of the Stadium of Domitian, an athletics arena built in the first century AD that held around thirty thousand spectators, and the houses around it stand on the stadium's seating. In the seventeenth century Pope Innocent X, whose family palace faced the square, turned it into a showcase. At the centre, Gian Lorenzo Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers, completed in 1651, sets an Egyptian-style obelisk on a hollow rock with four giant river gods representing the Nile, the Ganges, the Danube and the Río de la Plata — the Nile's head is veiled, because its source was then unknown. Facing it rises Sant'Agnese in Agone, the church largely designed by Bernini's rival Francesco Borromini, with its concave facade and elegant dome; Roman legend says Bernini's river gods recoil in horror from Borromini's church, though the fountain came first. Two more fountains anchor the ends, the Fountain of the Moor and the Fountain of Neptune. Today the square is a living room for locals and visitors alike, with portrait artists, buskers and café terraces, and it is free and open at every hour. For centuries the square was flooded in summer for water festivals. Below the north end, the excavated remains of the ancient stadium are open as a small paid museum that shows the arches and seating beneath the modern city — a fascinating half hour that most visitors miss.

Navona changes character through the day. Early morning, with the cafés setting up and the fountains splashing in empty air, is the time for photographs and for really looking at Bernini's sculpture — walk around the Four Rivers to see each god and the animals carved into the rock, including a horse, a lion and an armadillo-like creature. Late afternoon and dusk bring the passeggiata, the evening stroll, when the square fills with families, artists and musicians and the facades turn gold. The cafés on the square charge heavily for the view; it is often more rewarding to have your coffee or aperitivo a street away and come back to wander. In December the square traditionally hosts a Christmas and Befana market, though its form varies from year to year.

Inside Sant'Agnese in Agone, the church is free to enter and generally open, with a remarkable domed interior and a shrine connected to the young martyr Agnes. The Stadium of Domitian museum, entered from Piazza di Tor Sanguigna at the northern end, shows the ancient arena's arches several metres below street level. Palazzo Altemps, a branch of the National Roman Museum with superb classical sculpture in a Renaissance palace, is just north of the square for anyone wanting a quiet museum hour.

The lanes around Navona are some of the most atmospheric in Rome. Via dei Coronari, running west, is lined with antique dealers. Santa Maria della Pace, tucked behind the square, has Raphael's Sibyls and a cloister by Bramante. Via del Governo Vecchio has vintage shops and casual places to eat. The Pantheon is five minutes east and Campo de' Fiori five minutes south, so Navona is the centrepiece of any walk through the centro storico, and an excellent place to finish a day — staying nearby at a hotel such as the Raphael puts it right on your doorstep.