Leading to St. Peter's Square is the street of Conciliation; this new, direct, monumental approach to the Vatican, from Rome, was called Conciliation to comemorate the signing of the Lateran Pact in 1929, and was inaugurated in 1950 on the ocassion of the Jubilee Year.
We are welcomed by the magnificent Piazza San Pietro, St. Peters Square, the arhitectural masterpiece by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. 284 Tuscan columns arranged in a quadruple row and 89 pillars from the two huge semicircles enclosing it. The entablature is crowned by 140 statues of saints and the large coats of arms of Pope Alexander VII Chigi, who commisioned the work.
This Piazza was built in a short time (between 1655 and 1667) mainly because the arhitectural project was overseen by Bernini himself. The oldest monument in the square is the monolithic Egyptian obelisk, which stands in the center. Caligula had brought it to Rome to decorate his Circus and near it St. Peter was probably crucified with his had down.
In 1586 under Sixtus V obelisc was re-erected on its present site and later upon it was placed the emblem of the Chigi Pope Alexander VII, the five small mounts and the star in bronze, this device containing a relic of the Cross.The two beautiful fountains were built at different times: the one of the right by Maderno, and the other by Bernini, in 1677, which was the last monument put within the colonade.
Set into the paving, between the fountains and the obelisk, are two round stone slabs; standing on either of these and observing the colonade, you have the impression that St. Peter's Square is encircled by a single row of columns instead of a quadruple one.
Visitors and Romans gather every Sunday on St. Peter's Square for the Pope's blessing and particularly on January 1 st, Palm Sunday and, of course, on Easter Sunday and Christmas.
