Palazzo Ricci (Ricci Paracciani)

The palace was built in the early sixteenth century for the Calcagni, Tuscan nobles in Rome from the late fifteenth century. The Del Bene sold it in 1533 to Fabio Arcella, and in 1542 it passed to Luigi Gaddi and then to Costanza Farnese, who lived there and enlarged it; on her death in 1545 it went to her son Cardinal Guido Ascanio Sforza. Giulio Ricci bought it in 1577, moving here from Palazzo Sacchetti on the same street, and the via Giulia and vicolo di S. Aurea façades were built in 1634. Luigi Fontana's late-nineteenth-century repainting was removed in recent restorations except on the attic. Mario Praz lived here, and Monsignor Della Casa wrote the Galateo here about 1555.