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.
Montemirabile Chapel (Santa Maria del Popolo)
The chapel is named after Giovanni Montemirabile (an italianized name for Jean de Montmirail), the bishop of Vaison and confidant of Pope Sixtus IV, who was buried here after the chapel had been built in the 1470s. This was the first of the original four identitcal chapels on the left side and it was dedicated to St. John the Baptist. The chapel was transformed into the baptistery of the basilica in 1561. After 1568 a Renaissance funeral monument was built for Cardinal Francesco Abbondio Castiglioni by the right side wall. The monumental Renaissance wall tomb of Cardinal Antoniotto Pallavicini was transferred to the chapel in the second quarter of the 17th century, its bulk partially hiding from view or replacing the original painted decoration of the left wall. In 1657 fragments of a demolished quattrocento monument from the choir were reassembled in the chapel in the form of two aediculae by Cardinal Flavio Chigi, the nephew of Pope Alexander VII, who was Cardinal-Priest of the basilica at the time.