Santa Maria in Trastevere

It's possible that Santa Maria in Trastevere, a populous area on the right bank of the Tiber, was the first church in Rome where Christians were permitted to hold services in public. It was constructed beginning in the year 221 and was finished in the year 340. It was restored in the 12th century and redecorated in the Baroque era.

The church is equipped with a Romanesque campanile, a mosaic-covered front, and a portico that houses early Christian sarcophagi. It's difficult to decide which interior feature to notice first: the exquisite marble floor inlay, the gilded, coffered wood ceiling, or the magnificent medieval mosaics in the apse. These depict episodes from the life of the Virgin by Pietro Cavallini in the late 13th century below a frieze of lambs and above Christ, the Virgin, and saints. Mino del Reame built the tabernacle at the western end of the nave, which is seen there.