Rome Italy
2016

https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonna_dell%27Immacolata_(Roma)

The Column of the Immaculate Conception is a nineteenth-century monument in central Rome depicting the Blessed Virgin Mary, located in what is called Piazza Mignanelli, towards the south east part of Piazza di Spagna. It was placed aptly in front of the offices of the Palazzo di Propaganda Fide which houses the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.

Since December 1953, Pontiffs have visited the monument annually and offered a bouquet of flowers at the base of the column with help of Roman firemen commemorating the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

The Marian monument was designed by the architect Luigi Poletti, and commissioned by Ferdinand II, King of the Two Sicilies. In part, he wanted to put closure to the dispute between Naples and the Papal States that had developed in the last century, when Naples abolished the Chinea, a yearly tribute offered to the Pope as ultimate sovereign of Naples.

The column was dedicated on 8 December 1857, celebrating the recently adopted dogma of the Immaculate Conception of 1854. The dogma had been widely proclaimed Ex cathedra via the Papal bull Ineffabilis Deus by Pope Pius IX.

The actual structure is a square marble base with statues of biblical figures at the corners that uphold a column of Cipollino marble of 11.8 meters. Atop the column is a bronze statue of the Virgin Mary, the work of Giuseppe Obici. The standard imagery of the immaculate conception is used: a virgin on a crescent, atop the world, stomping a serpent (a symbol of the original sin assigned to all humans since Adam and Eve; except the perfected sinless Virgin Mary).