Vatican City State
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Piazza San Pietro in the Vatican City, Rome, Italy. The elliptical piazza forms the entrance to St Peter's Basilica and was designed by Gianlorenzo Bernini in 1656. In the foreground, surmounted by a cross, is the Obelisk of the Vatican.
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St Peter's Basilica, in the Vatican City, Rome, Italy. This is the cathedral church of the Vatican City State. Above the baroque façade of the building are statues representing Jesus, St John the Baptist, and the Apostles (excluding St Peter, who is represented by a bronze statue in the nave, inside the building).
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The Piazza San Pietro (St Peter's Square), in the Vatican City State. The square is enclosed by Gianlorenzo Bernini's 17th-century elliptical colonnade. St Peter's Basilica, the cathedral itself, is the main Roman Catholic church in this clerical state, and took more than a century to build.
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St Peter's Square, Vatican City, Rome. View from the dome of the basilica. The square was designed by Gianlorenzo Bernini in 1656. A section of the elliptical colonnade that surrounds the square can be seen on the right, with some of the 162 statues of saints that surmount it.
Sovereign area within the city of Rome, Italy.
Government
The absolute head of state of the Vatican City is the pope, who is elected for life by the Sacred College of Cardinals. He appoints, for five-year periods, a pontifical commission (a body of Roman Catholic cardinals) to act as a legislature and, under the lead of the commission's president, administer the state's affairs on the pope's behalf and under his direction. The pope is Benedict XVI, from 2005.History
The pope has traditionally been based in Rome, where the Vatican has been a papal residence since 1377; the Vatican Palace is one of the largest in the world and contains a valuable collection of works of art.The Vatican City State came into being through the Lateran Treaty of 1929, under which Italy recognized the sovereignty of the pope over the city of the Vatican. The 1947 Italian constitution reaffirmed the Lateran Treaty, and under its terms, Roman Catholicism became the state religion in Italy, enjoying special privileges. This remained so until, under a new 1984 Concordat (ratified in 1985), Catholicism ceased to be the state religion.
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