Rome, Victor Emmanuel Memorial

(2 photos)

As we headed down the wide staircase from Rome’s City Hall we couldn’t miss the ostentatious immensity of the marble monument to Victor Emmanuel II, towering off to our right. The white marble building looks as if it belongs on top of a wedding cake. This memorial seems to dominate Rome by its location, its size, and the stark white marble used to cover its exterior. It just doesn’t seem to fit the neighborhood. It’s a beautiful building, it just looks out of place.

One might think that a rather exceptional looking building that’s over 100 years old, would rightfully dominate its area, but when we consider that the incredible buildings just down the street in a couple of directions were already between one and two thousand years old when this one was built, we can see it takes more than a pile of white marble to win the battle of dominance. If the Memorial to Victor Emmanuel II had been built in most any other capital city in the world it would be a winner, in Rome it’s a distraction.
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Well, is it possible to have too many photos of such an unusual, but fascinating building?