Statue of Pope Urban VIII

In 1635 the Conservatori, the magistrates who governed the city from this palace, decided to honour the reigning pope, Urban VIII Barberini, with a marble statue larger than life, and agreed a fee of 2,000 scudi with Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The museum credits the figure to Bernini and his assistants, and it was finished in 1640.

He was not made for this spot. The pope first sat in the middle of the long wall, between two frescoes by the painter Cavalier d'Arpino, the duel of the Horatii and the Curiatii and the battle of King Tullus Hostilius against the Veientes and the Fidenates. In 1798, while French troops occupied Rome, the statue was taken down. Another papal statue in the hall fared worse. The bronze of Sixtus V, the pope of the 1580s, cast by Taddeo Landini, was destroyed. After a restoration in 1816, Pope Pius VII had Urban set on a new base at the short end of the room, in the place where the bronze Sixtus had stood.