The Madonna dell'Archetto
Trevi Fountain
Rome Italy
2016

You may have noticed many images of the Virgin Mary that can be found on many corners in Rome.

https://www.tourist-in-rom.com/en/the-madonna-dellarchetto/

Rome, the center of Christianity, offers representations of the Madonna everywhere: inside and on the facades of churches but also along the streets in suggestive sacred shrines to which many stories are linked. Today we will talk about the Madonna dell’Archetto, one of the most revered representations in the eternal city.

Origins of the sacred aedicules
Going around Rome we meet many sacred aedicules, which can also be described as shrines, of which most can be traced back to the period between the seventeenth and nineteenth century. But the origins of these shrines, which contain not only Madonnas but also sacred images of all kinds, must be sought far back in time.

Aedicules have a pluri-millennial history. In fact, they were already present in ancient Roman times and even in ancient civilizations such as the Egyptian one. However, they contained pagan images of ancestors and protectors such as the Lares, and were positioned inside the houses (to protect the resident family) and on the crossroads of the streets to protect and guide the traveler in a Rome without lighting in the evening and night.

With the advent of Christianity, the images of the pagan gods were replaced by sacred images belonging to the new ruling religion, and the Roman people began to call them “Madonnelle”.