Vatican Splendors and many other richly adorned possessions and religious items used by previous popes in the past. "'This is just a taste of all the wealth of art and its beauty the Vatican owns,' said Monsignor Roberto Zagnoli, one of three curators of the Vatican Museums." The most unusual papal artifact there is the bronze sculpture of John Paul II's hands. It is special because it is the only item people are allowed to touch. The papal display is completed with many portraits and busts of the popes as well as a chronological presentation of all the bishops of Rome beginning
Vatican City century during the pontificate of Pope Symmachus (reigned 498–514). Popes gradually came to have a secular role as governors of regions near Rome. They ruled the Papal States, which covered a large portion of the Italian peninsula, for more than a thousand years until the mid-19th century, when all the territory belonging to the papacy was seized by the newly created Kingdom of Italy. For most of this time the popes did not live at the Vatican. The Lateran Palace, on the opposite side of Rome was their habitual residence for about a thousand years. From 1309 to 1377, they