Lentorama 2026: Hic es: aedificia Vaticani

Day 13: Vatican Publishing House, Via della Posta

Sixtus V founded the Vatican Publishing House in 1587, and for centuries it included both a press and a bookstore. That bookstore was spun off into its own entity in 1926 by Piux XI, and became a publishing house charged with the production and sales of books printed by the publishing house. 

The house mostly handled official documents and publications of the Vatican, but would later move into publishing works by popes. It turns out that the house holds the copyright to all papal writings, but didn't enforce the copyright until Benedict XVI took office. They stated that the copyright is only enforced in cases where a text no more than 50 years old is republished without citing the Vatican copyright.

In 2015 Francis announced the formation of a Secretariat of Communication, and the house (along with the press) was moved under its umbrella.

Lentorama 2026: Hic es: aedificia Vaticani

Day 12: Museo Pio-Cristiano

Founded two years after the establishment of the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology, Pope Pius IX founded this museum in 1854 as a place to house excavated items that could not be conserved where found (though a number of items already in Vatican or Roman collections found their way here).

The museum has two halves, one dedicated to monuments, sculptures, and mosaics, the other to inscriptions. The former is open to the public, and apparently has a good collection of sarcophagi. The latter half is for academics only.

Originally housed in the Lateran Palace, the museum was moved to a new building in 1963.

 Lentorama 2026: Hic es: aedificia Vaticani

Day 11: Church of San Pellegrino in the Vatican, Via dei Pellegrini

Built around 800 by Pope Leo III, it is named for St. Peregrine of Auxerre, who was martyred while serving as that city's first bishop in the third century AD. It was originally San Pellegrino in Naumachia, referencing  nearby facility for staging mock naval battles.

After a couple of stints assigned to a Vatican monastery, Clement X gave the church to the Swiss Guard in the 17th century, and for a time it would be the national church of Switzerland in Rome. Today it's the home church of the Vatican's gendarmerie and fire fighters.