Santa Maria del Popolo
Soon after its transfer to the prestigious Lombard Congregation Santa Maria del Popolo was reconstructed between 1472 and 1477 on the orders of Pope Sixtus IV. This was part of the ambitious urban renovation program of the pope who presented himself as "Urbis Restaurator" of Rome. The medieval church was entirely demolished and a new three-aisled, Latin cross shaped basilica was built with four identical chapels on both sides, an octagonal dome above the crossing and a tall Lombard style bell-tower at the end of the right transept. The result of this reconstruction was an early and excellent example of Italian Renaissance architecture in Rome. In spite of the many later changes the basilica essentially kept its Sistine form until today.
Santa Maria del Popolo
The well-known foundation legend of Santa Maria del Popolo revolves around the evil memory of Emperor Nero and Pope Paschal II cleansing the area from this malicious legacy. As the story goes, after his suicide Nero was buried in the mausoleum of his paternal family, the Domitii Ahenobarbi, at the foot of the Pincian Hill. The sepulchre was later buried under a landslide and on its ruins grew a huge walnut tree that ″was so tall and sublime that no other plant exceeded it in any ways.″ The tree soon became the haunt for a multitude of vicious demons harassing the inhabitants of the area and also the travelers arriving in the city from the north through Porta Flaminia: ″some were being frightened, possessed, cruelly beaten and injured, others almost strangled, or miserably killed.″