The Head Caravaggio Gave His Own Face, and Two More Puzzles

Three works on this route are still being argued about, and that is the thread the guide follows. In Caravaggio's David with the Head of Goliath, the severed head is a self-portrait. He painted himself as the monster, holding his own face up by the hair, at a point in his life when he was wanted for murder and hoping for a pardon. Nobody has settled what he meant by it. Titian's Sacred and Profane Love has had that title for centuries and art historians still cannot agree which of the two women is which, or whether the distinction is the right one at all. Bernini's Apollo and Daphne catches the transformation at the exact moment it becomes irreversible: bark closing over one leg, fingers already leaves. Marble, cut so thin at the edges that it reads as foliage. Two hours, skip-the-line, a group of no more than fifteen. The gallery is reservation-only and sits in the park, which is why it stays quiet. The tour ends inside, so you can stay on until your slot runs out. Afterwards the gardens are open, and the Pincio terrace above Piazza del Popolo is a fifteen-minute walk.