Piazza Novona

Piazza Navona was built on the foundations of the Stadium of Domitian — a first-century AD racetrack whose oval shape the piazza still preserves. Three fountains run down its length: the Fontana del Moro and the Fontana del Nettuno at the ends, and Bernini's masterpiece, the Fountain of the Four Rivers, in the center. The piazza has been a public space continuously since the third century, when the stadium was last used for athletic games.

Photographed in October 2016 during my first trip to Italy. Piazza Navona is one of those Roman spaces where the layers of history are not only visible but architectural — the modern piazza is the ancient stadium, more or less, repurposed and repaved.