Piazza di Santa Maria Maggiore is located in the centre of Rome between via Gioberti (Esquiline) and via Merulana (Esquiline-Monti). Its name derives from the Basilica di St. Mary Major the largest and most important of the Roman Basilicas dedicated to the Virgin, which dominates one of the three peaks of the Esquiline hill, the Cispio summit. Legend holds that Pope Liberio in 352 C.E. dreamt that the Virgin indicated that he should build a church where he found snow. That morning, on 5 August, in the midst of a torrid Roman summer, it snowed on the Esquiline Hill. On that date every year, the miracle is evoked with white petals falling from the ceiling of the Pauline Chapel.
The entrance to the Basilica is protected by a bronze statue of the Virgin with Child by Guillaume Berthélot and Orazio Censore on top of the only marble column retrieved intact from the Basilica of Massenzio, placed here by Carlo Maderno for Pope Paul V in 1615. At the foot of the column is a fountain with a large travertine basin.
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