This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Piazza della Minerva" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(February 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Piazza della Minerva
City square
Piazza della Minerva towards the Pantheon
Location	Rome,Italy
Interactive map of Piazza della Minerva
Coordinates:41°53′53″N12°28′39″E / 41.89806°N 12.47750°E /41.89806; 12.47750

Piazza della Minerva is apiazza inRome,Italy, near thePantheon. Its name derives from the existence of a temple built on the site byPompey dedicated toMinerva Calcidica, whose statue is now in theVatican Museums.

Facing this piazza are:

• the church ofSanta Maria sopra Minerva, centre of the square, already attested in the 8th century by the Anonymous of Einsiedeln by the name(ecclesia) "S. Mariae in Minervio". To the right of its facade are inscriptions built into the wall commemorating the flooding of theRiver Tiber between 1422 and 1598 - the area of the piazza is the lowest in Rome, and so was always the first to suffer in flooding.
• A convent (orcasa professa) of theDominicans, who held the nearby church from the 13th century. This expanded over time to Via del Seminario and to thechurch of San Macuto, in the space formerly occupied by three Roman temples - the aforementionedMinervium, theIseum, and theSerapeum.

From the 17th century, the convent became the base of theRoman Inquisition orHoly Office, and it housed the trial and recantation ofGalileo Galilei. Little remains of the Dominican complex except its cloister: This had been largely rebuilt from the original building, and expropriated by the state in 1870 as the seat of the Ministry of Public Education and for a short time the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications. The cloister now holds the library of theItalian Senate, dedicated toGiovanni Spadolini.

• At the centre of the piazza, backing onto the Inquisition convent, is the 1667Elephant and Obelisk byBernini. This obelisk was excavated in the cloister and came from theIseum.^[1] The elephant was known as "il pulcin della Minerva", or "porcino", from the Roman people's story that ― uninspired by elephants ― Bernini in fact sculpted a pig.
• To the right of the church stands the 16th centuryPalazzo Fonseca, since 1832 the site of one of the historic hotels of Rome, known as theMinerva, whose guests have includedStendhal andJosé de San Martín, remembered in plaques on the facade.
• Opposite the church is thePalazzo dell'accademia ecclesiastica (the former Accademia dei nobili ecclesiastici), 14th century in origin but completely rebuilt in 1878. It is an academy that trains the diplomats ofVatican City.

• Piazza del Gesù

• (in Italian)"Roma segreta"Archived 2009-03-12 at theWayback Machine
• High-resolution 360° Panoramas and Images ofPiazza della Minerva| Art Atlas
• Piazza della Minerva travel guide from Wikivoyage
• Media related toPiazza della Minerva (Rome) at Wikimedia Commons

• Piazzas in Rome
• Rome R. IX Pigna
• Minerva

• Pages using gadget WikiMiniAtlas
• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Articles needing additional references from February 2024
• All articles needing additional references
• Pages using infobox mapframe without shape links in Wikidata
• Coordinates on Wikidata
• Articles with Italian-language sources (it)
• Webarchive template wayback links
• Commons category link from Wikidata
• Pages using the Kartographer extension