Mouth of Truth & Santa Maria in Cosmedin
Why is it significant?
Look into the portico of the little brick church with the slender bell tower, and you will see a queue of people waiting to put their hand into the mouth of a giant marble face.
Key Facts
| Place | Mouth of Truth & Santa Maria in Cosmedin |
|---|---|
| Address | Piazza della Bocca della Verità 18, 00186 Roma RM, Italy |
| Geo Coordinates | 41.88820, 12.48150 |
| Part of Walk | The Keyhole and the Amphora Hill: Aventine Secrets & Testaccio's Roman Soul |
| Generated | Generated |
Look into the portico of the little brick church with the slender bell tower, and you will see a queue of people waiting to put their hand into the mouth of a giant marble face. Its eyes are hollow, its lips are open, and the beard flows down like water... which is a clue, because that is probably exactly what it once was.
The Bocca della Verità, the Mouth of Truth, is a disc of marble about a metre and three quarters across. Most archaeologists think it began life as an ancient drain cover, maybe from the temple of Hercules a few steps away, the face of a river god or of Oceanus through whose mouth rainwater disappeared. It only arrived in this portico in 1632. But by then, Romans had been telling stories about it for centuries.
The legend says that if you tell a lie with your hand inside the mouth, it will bite it off. Medieval husbands supposedly brought suspicious wives here to swear their fidelity. And in the film Roman Holiday, in 1953, Gregory Peck pulled his arm out with the hand hidden in his sleeve. The story goes that he had kept the trick from Audrey Hepburn... and that the scream you hear in the film is real.
Now step back and look at the church itself, Santa Maria in Cosmedin. In the eighth century this was the church of the Greek community, refugees from the Byzantine East, and the strange word Cosmedin comes from the Greek for ornament. Inside, the floor is a carpet of cut marble in the Cosmati style, and in a side chapel rests a skull crowned with flowers, venerated as that of Saint Valentine. Yes... that Saint Valentine.
All around you lay the Forum Boarium, the ancient cattle market, where boats from the river unloaded and Rome first grew rich on trade. Two temples from that age still stand across the road, almost untouched. Now cross the square and head south, along the road that leads to the greatest stadium the ancient world ever built.