Quirinal obelisk

The Quirinal Obelisk (Obelisco del Quirinale) is one of the thirteen ancient obelisks of Rome. It stands in the Piazza del Quirinale on the Quirinal Hill, the highest of Rome's hills and forms the centrepiece of the Fountain of the Dioscuri (depicting Castor and Pollux). The square is dominated by the Quirinal Palace, the official residence of the the President of the Italian Republic. The obelisk is anepigraphic (without hieroglyphic inscriptions) and was probably manufactured in Egypt during the Roman period, rather than being a genuine Pharaonic monument. It is one of a pair that originally flanked the entrance to the Mausoleum of Augustus; its twin is the Esquiline Obelisk, which has been re-erected in Piazza dell'Esquilino. Both are made of red Aswan granite. The monolith of the Quirinal obelisk stands at 14.64m tall (29.94m on its base). An interesting feature of both the Esquiline and the Quirinal obelisks is that they lack the pyramidion (the top, shaped like a pyramid) that is found on the vast majority of obelisks quarried in Egypt. It has been proposed that the reason for this curious omission is that the Romans who commissioned it did not understand the significance of the pyramidion and simply did not ask for it. The obelisks were lost, toppling at some point during the Middle Ages. They were rediscovered several times before finally being excavated and re

Monument data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).