Orange Garden (Giardino degli Aranci, Parco Savello)

Garden · Aventino (Parco Savello)Rome,Italy

The courtyard of a medieval fortress on Rome's Aventine, planted with bitter orange trees, its parapet looking west over the city to St Peter's.

The Orange Garden is the open courtyard of a medieval fortress. The Savelli family held this corner of the Aventine hill in the thirteenth century, and their crenellated brick wall is what you lean on at the western end. In 1932 the city planted the enclosure with bitter orange trees in straight rows and opened it to the public, so the whole garden is one rectangle of dark leaves with a stone parapet across the far end. It is small. From the parapet the ground drops away to the Tiber and the city spreads out flat to the west. The dome of St Peter's stands up clearly to the right, and the sun goes down to the left of it, over the river and the wooded ridge of the Janiculum. The two are in the same view but never line up, whatever the photographs suggest. On the next square, a gate belonging to the Knights of Malta has a keyhole that frames the dome down a clipped avenue of hedges. That gate is the only building Giovanni Battista Piranesi ever completed.

Worth knowing

Good to know

Check the closing time before planning an evening visit — In winter the garden shuts well before sunset, and the wall at the far end is the only place with the view.
The hour before sunset is shoulder to shoulder at the parapet — come mid-morning instead and you get the same view with room to stand, and the orange trees are actually visible.
Come up from Piazza Albania if stairs are a problem — the approach from the river is the Clivo di Rocca Savella, a long steep stair, while the other side is level all the way in.

Things to do

1
Cross the garden down its centre line
Enter from the square and walk straight down the central path between the rows of orange trees, keeping your eyes down. The branches meet overhead and hide the sky, so nothing of the view shows until you reach the parapet at the far end, where the whole western half of Rome opens in front of you at once. Looking up early spoils the effect.
2
Queue for the keyhole next door
On the neighbouring square, put your eye to the keyhole of the Knights of Malta gate. A clipped hedge avenue runs away from you and the dome of St Peter's sits exactly at the end of it, small and sharp. There is usually a short line, and everyone in it takes under a minute.
3
Sit under the trees in the morning
In the first hours the garden is used by people who live nearby: prams, dogs, old men on the benches along the walls. The oranges on the trees are bitter and inedible, and they stay on the branches for months. Take a bench facing back into the garden rather than out at the view.