Wedding photo of a Neapolitan couple.

Rome has been the home of many a romantic encounter—it’s from the name Rome, after all, that we derive the word “romance”. So, there’s no better place to bring your beloved if you want to explore the nuances of love, past and present. Schedule your visit for Valentine’s Day and you’ll be celebrating a “Roman Holiday” loaded with history.

One tradition says that in the 3^rd century AD, Valentine was a Christian priest imprisoned for his beliefs. While in prison, he cured a young girl of her blindness and she fell in love with him.

Though she was the jailer’s daughter, she wasn’t able to intervene to save his life and on the eve of his execution he slipped a note to her saying, “From Your Valentine”. Whether or not any of this happened is much disputed (and we know for certain that candy hearts came later), but a visit to Rome will give you a chance to see some of the monuments dedicated to love. Not least among these are the remains of Saint Valentine, preserved in the beautiful church of SANTA PRASSEDE.

The Early Christian saints of Rome didn’t have a monopoly on love stories, however. The tradition of celebrating love and romance goes back much further in Roman history to a time when the key players in love’s drama were the Roman gods and goddesses. Despite their immortality, the host of Roman deities was not free from the trials and tribulations of love. Their relationships were as messy as those in a present-day soap opera or reality show.

Take Cupid himself, the god of love, who fell for a mortal vixen, Psyche. As if this intergalactic couple didn’t have enough of their own issues, Cupid’s mother, Venus, hated Psyche because the mortal woman’s beauty had upstaged the goddess and interfered with the activities of Venus’s earthly fan club. Psyche moved in with Cupid and the first months were filled with blissful passion. But, then, Psyche’s broken promises and a lack of full disclosure on the part of Cupid led to a split up that was reconciled only after extensive third-party intervention.

Their wedding, portrayed by Raphael and his school of artists in the Renaissance VILLA FARNESINA, was attended by the pantheon of gods and goddesses. There was no prenup, but the vows were unique for they called for Psyche to drink of the godly potion ambrosia and thereby become a goddess herself. The child born to the two of them is a reminder of what happens when bodies and minds meet in bliss, for her name was Pleasure.

Not all the immortals were so lucky. Visitors to Rome’s GALLERIA BORGHESE can indulge their melancholy and mourn the unrequited love of Apollo while they admire Gianlorenzo Bernini’s Baroque sculpture of APOLLO AND DAPHNE. The first love of Apollo, god of poetry and music, was Daphne, a nymph and daughter of a river god. Like many first loves, however, this one was not meant to be. Apollo, the bright and shining star of the gods, ridiculed Cupid, the immortal little guy, and what an error!  Cupid, keeper of love’s arrows may have been small, but he was a powerhouse.

In his quiver were two types of arrows, those with lead tips and those that glisten with golden heads. Shot with the golden darts, lovers met their dream partners and lived happily ever after. Shot with the lead-tipped arrows, however, lovers found themselves head over heels with the one that would drive them crazy.

That was Apollo’s fate. As he set his sights on Daphne, Cupid hit him with a lead dart and from that moment on it was clear that this love would end unhappily. Apollo chased Daphne but she had no interest in him whatsoever. As she fled, Daphne prayed to her father who spared her the indignity of becoming the first notch in Apollo’s belt. Apollo caught Daphne, grabbed her torso, but at that moment she was transformed into a laurel tree, leaving Apollo with nothing to show for his pursuit but a laurel crown that he wore on his head thereafter.

Ancient Romans enjoyed the amorous escapades of their gods and they also counted on the immortals to aid them in their own romantic pursuits. A Roman state monument helped as well. In the year 121 AD, the Emperor Hadrian began constructing a temple between the Roman Forum and the Colosseum. The massive structure, the TEMPLE OF VENUS AND ROME, was meant to house two goddesses important to Roman life. Venus Felix, goddess of love, fertility, and prosperity was the ancestress of the Roman people, and in Hadrian’s temple she was paired with Roma Aeterna, the immortal personification of the Roman state. The temple honored the Golden Age that Rome was experiencing under the reign of the two goddesses but it came to mean more to the population of Rome. At an altar set up near the temple all married couples sacrificed to the goddesses, asking Venus and Rome, Love and the State, to watch over their union.

Lovers in today’s Rome would like to believe that they have a bit more control over their romantic fates and that’s where the Baroque TREVI FOUNTAIN comes into play. At the center of the fountain is the god Oceanus, whose success in love is demonstrated by the fact that his wife Tethys bore 6000 children!  Neither the children nor his wife are shown on the fountain but the spirit of their love must have filtered into the cascading waters as Roman lore says that it is here that love-hopefuls can hedge their bets.

Tradition suggests that visitors who throw one coin in the fountain will return to Rome, but two coins will bring love, and three will grant the pleasure of marrying in the Eternal City. It certainly worked for the young American girls featured in the 1954 movie Three Coins in a Fountain. The powers of the waters were further explored by Anita Ekberg, who opted not for coins but for a sunrise splash, in the 1960 film La Dolce Vita, and, of course, by Audrey Hepburn, who “loved” the fountain and everything else in Rome in the 1953 Roman Holiday.

These days, love’s not just found on film in Rome. Those who have carefully thrown their coins in the Trevi might head to the PIAZZA DEL CAMPIDOGLIO for an up-close view of Eternal Rome-ance. The hilltop piazza was designed by Michelangelo in the Renaissance and the drop-dead beautiful spot houses Rome’s sculpture museums and civic offices. One of the star pieces in the museum is an ancient sculpture known as the CAPITOLINE VENUS. The goddess of love stands demurely in a niche, covering herself modestly with her hands. Her sculptor, it seems, interrupted her as she was going for a bath and now we’re all intruders gazing upon her bathing ritual. But Venus isn’t too busy in the bath to look out for the modern lovers getting married one story below.

The Piazza del Campidoglio is the site of Rome’s civil marriage office and on Saturday mornings the piazza is filled with beautiful brides, charming grooms, and well-dressed wedding parties. Post-ceremony happy couples ride through the city in a procession of honking and decorated cars, and even Vespas. Most often they’re headed off to a big wedding reception, but en route they stop to have photos made in front of ancient monuments, so it’s not unusual to see brides and grooms posing artfully in front of the Colosseum or the Arch of Constantine. Even in the realm of love, the past is very much a part of Rome’s present-day life, serving as a stage-set for Eternal Rome-ance.