Set in its own secluded grounds, this church dates from the 5th century and is the Hungarian national church in Rome. It feels more like a temple than a church, with an unusual, circular interior and inner colonnade. On the walls is a cycle of 16th-century frescoes graphically depicting the tortures suffered by many early Christian martyrs.
Describing the frescoes in 1846, Charles Dickens wrote: "Such a panorama of horror and butchery no man could imagine in his sleep, though he were to eat a whole pig, raw, for supper." The church, one of Rome’s oldest, dates from the late 5th century, although it was subsequently altered in the 12th and 15th centuries.
