Basilica: The Splendor and the Scandal: Building St. Peter's, by R. A. Scotti (Viking 2006) [B&T Books] NA5620.S9 S36 2006.

I have never been to Europe, let alone Vatican City. The closest I have come to St. Peter's (sometimes simply called the Vatican) would be a very nicely crafted coffee table book, so one might wonder whether I have any business reviewing a book on one of the great architectural achievements of the Renaissance. Although there is something to such criticism, if I were to stick to only what I really knew (a) I would not learn as much, (b) there would be fewer book reviews, and (c) the few books left to be reviewed could not hold a candle to pleasure one receives from R. A. Scotti's Basilica. Besides, Basilica does wander into Church History, consequently, so I am not completely out of my element.

Looking at the sheer solidity and audacity of St. Peter's, one is almost tempted to think it has been there forever (and why not, Rome is the Eternal City). What must be remembered, however, is that the basilica that preceded it had been revered for almost 1200 years. The audacity of razing that ancient center of pilgrimage by itself scandalized the faithful. This new St. Peter's was perhaps the crowning effort to transform Rome from a has-been backwater to the center of European culture and assert for all time Rome's place in Christendom. Urban renewal does not even begin to plumb meaning of what was going from the early 16^th to the mid 17^th centuries, nor the depth of feeling toward the brazenness of those who set forth this enterprise. Yet this new St. Peter's almost had to be of unparalleled magnificence, if only to justify the destruction of the old.

The building of this new St. Peter's could not have come at a more opportune time with the flowering of Renaissance in such geniuses as Raphael and Michelangelo or of the unparalleled opportunity to actualize such genius in a project that would define an era and the ambitious and powerful patrons (including a particularly aggressive succession of popes). On the other hand, the rebuilding of Rome came at a time of crisis in the western Church, a crisis Rome seemed to be oblivious to and the cure it offered--a basilica and Holy City that would inspire--worse than useless.

This is the story Scotti tells and its telling almost matches that of the basilica itself. It is a tale of ambitious popes willing to do almost anything lift Rome out of the mire that it had been left in during the Babylonian Captivity in Avignon. Scotti recounts the drive that set powerful men to lift seat of the Church to be the first city of all Christendom, and all feuding ambition and opportunism that goes with it. Architects and engineers both reclaim techniques and aesthetic sensibilities from the ancients devise entirely new ones for a feat that had been unprecedented and all must answer to a most power patron. St. Peter's is both a victim of events and a shaper of them. As Scotti tells it, the decay of Rome's ancient ruins is more than matched by its political and moral turpitude and worldly spirituality. The wealth required to maintain this undisciplined climb was funneled in from Northern Europe where princes were already growing restive and were more than willing listen to the likes of Martin Luther. The tearing down of the Basilica built by Constantine so that Church might be exalted at the price of its flock was more than a metaphor.

Over two thirds of Basilica is dedicated to this titanic struggle of popes, princes, artists, and reformers (both Protestant and Catholic) and it is told brilliantly. Unfortunately, history is not nearly as neat and writers of history would like it. Had the new St. Peter's been completed by the time the Council of Trent had concluded, things could have been tidied up nicely. Perhaps even if one stretched things out another forty years or so to the sinking of the Spanish Armada (and with it the last attempt to retrieve the Church of England for Rome) one could have found a pleasing synchronicity. But history is cruel not only to those who live it, but for those who write about it. The building of the new basilica stretches not only past the artistic sensibilities of the Renaissance but into the late Baroque. Scotti does what she can with the wreckage which is the completing of a marvel, but neither the closing nor beginning of anything nearly so epic as to match it. Are the likes of Alexander VII and Gianlorenzo Bernini really fit bookends to Julius II and Bramante or Michelangelo? No, but that is what history has given us, and Scotti does the best she can with it.

Aside from a few quibbles about how she treats the world of late antiquity and the medieval period (which aren’t her focus) and the occasional biblical gaff (for instance, she has Jesus entering Solomon's Temple, not Herod's), there is much to recommend here. There are insights and sidelights the capture not only the times but the actors of those times. Also, there are useful aids, such as a timeline and illustrations to put the times and the people in perspective. Scotti weaves an intriguing and engaging tale of a world we cannot relive that is yet wholly familiar in her telling of it.

Jimm Wetherbee

Updated August 14, 2008