by A Texas-born princess piled her four bichon frize dogs into a taxi on Thursday after being evicted, following a bitter inheritance dispute, from a historic villa in Rome that contains the only known ceiling painted by Caravaggio.
Princess Rita Jenrette Boncompagni Ludovisi, née Rita Carpenter, left the Casino dell’Aurora on glitzy Via Veneto hours after Carabinieri police arrived to enforce a court-ordered eviction warrant. Before she left, a locksmith changed the locks on the big green front door.
His dramatic exit, one of the dogs briefly escaping while talking to reporters on the street, capped off a remarkable soap opera that exposed the dirty laundry of one of Rome’s aristocratic families.
The Boncompagni Ludovisi are perhaps best known for having produced Pope Gregory XIII of Gregorian calendar fame. But lately they have drawn more attention due to the inheritance dispute and the court-ordered auction of their famous villa in the heart of Rome.
“I feel like I’m in a surreal movie, like Sartre’s ‘No Exit,’” the princess said in the street, interrupted repeatedly by a fluffy white dog barking in her arms and three others at her ankles.
The Casino dell’Aurora, also known as Villa Ludovisi, has been in the Ludovisi family since the early 17th century. After the death of Prince Nicolo Boncompagni Ludovisi in 2018, the villa became the subject of an inheritance dispute between the children of his first marriage and his third wife, Princess Rita, born in San Antonio, Texas, with whom he married. married in 2009.
Previously, she had been married to former US Representative John Jenrette Jr. from South Carolina.
The children have argued that the house, built in 1570, belongs to them, that their grandfather intended for them to inherit it and that their late father abused them and mismanaged his fortune. They mounted a multi-pronged legal campaign to gain control of the property so they could sell it.
The latest chapter in the saga came in January after Rome judge Miriam Iappelli issued an eviction order, accusing the princess of violating an earlier order barring her from taking guided tours of the property.
Boncompagni Ludovisi has said that the tours were necessary to raise funds to maintain the villa. In addition, the judge found that the princess had failed to keep the house in a “good state of repair” after an exterior wall collapsed.
One of the heirs, Prince Bante Boncompagni Ludovisi, was present at the villa on Thursday to see “that woman,” as he refers to his father’s widow, leave the property.
“This house needs reforms. The water pipes need to be restored and the frescoes are in danger,” he told reporters. “This is a country: we have our police, we have our judges, and you have to respect our country and our laws if you stay here.”
It is unclear who will now take over the work on the house, which needs at least 11 million euros in renovations to bring it up to date.
The villa was put up for auction by court order last year as part of the inheritance dispute and was assigned a court assessed value of 471 million euros ($533 million), largely due to Caravaggio. After the minimum bid of 353 million euros ($400 million) failed to find a buyer in the first auction, the price was progressively lowered in a series of successive auctions, with more scheduled until a buyer is found.
The Caravaggio ceiling graces a small room leading up a spiral staircase on the second floor. It was commissioned in 1597 by a diplomat and patron of the arts who asked the then young painter to decorate the ceiling of the small room used as an alchemy workshop. The 9-foot (2.75-meter)-wide mural, depicting Jupiter, Pluto, and Neptune, is unusual: it’s not a fresco, but oil painting on plaster, and represents the only ceiling mural Caravaggio ever painted.
While the fate of the villa is uncertain, so is that of the princess.
Boncompagni Ludovisi vowed the truth would eventually come out (and announced a book deal), insisted he had cared for the villa during the two decades he lived there, and digitized the family archive, with help from the University of Rutgers.
I don’t see logic in this. I was a good custodian of the villa,” she said.
He did not say where he would go next, though he noted that the Episcopal Church in Rome had reached out to help.
“I love Italy and I am so sorry to have such a brutal end to what has been a labor of love for 20 years,” he said. Her book, about the villa and its famous roof, is expected to be published later this year.
“It is dedicated to my husband, Nicolo,” she said, before speeding off with the dogs in a taxi into Roman traffic.
