The House of the Knights of Rhodes is one of Rome’s secret jewels. Nestled between the Forum of Augustus and the Forum of Trajan, the palace is the result of an incredible stratification spanning more than two thousand years.
In the year 2 B.C., the Temple of Mars Ultor (from Latin Ultor = Avenger) was inaugurated within the Forum of Augustus. Eight hundred years later, when the Forum of Augustus had already been abandoned, a church and monastery dedicated to St. Basil were built on the remains of the Temple. Another four hundred years passed and, in 1230, the complex passed to the Knights of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, also known as the Knights of Rhodes (now the Knights of Malta). Two hundred years later, exactly in 1466, Cardinal Marco Barbo, nephew of Pope Paul II, transformed the palace into a sumptuous Renaissance residence that can still be admired today, with elegant wooden ceilings, luxurious reception halls, precious works of art and the marvelous eight-arched loggia entirely frescoed, from which the pontiff would look out to bless the crowd. In 1566 the Order of Knights moved to the Aventine and Pope Pius V entrusted the structure to the Dominican Sisters, who enlarged the complex, dedicating it to the Most Holy Annunciation. In 1930 the convent portion was demolished as part of the demolition work for the opening of Via dell’Impero (now Via dei Fori Imperiali), inaugurated in 1932. After World War II, the palace was restored and entrusted again, from 1946, to the Sovereign Order of Malta.
This exclusive tour allows you to retrace the thousand-year history of this extraordinary palace and admire the rooms that embellish it: the Hall of Honor and the Hall of the Loggetta, with wooden panelling and fresco paintings, ancient maps and marble friezes from the Forum of Augustus, the stunning frescoed loggia overlooking the Imperial Forums and, descending to the underground level, the Palatine Chapel dedicated to St. John the Baptist, patron saint of the Order of the Knights of Malta, carved out of the still-visible remains of a Roman-era courtyard with travertine arches, overlooked by a large insula (apartment building).
