Two plaques (both nearly illegible) recall two 19th century restorations under Pope Pius IX, overseen by Virginio Vespignani, due to landslides caused by subsidence of the hill. The first in the curtain wall that joins the eleventh and twelfth bastions is dated 1858. The second plaque on the broad face of the thirteenth bastion dates back to 1870 and is probably the last evidence of its kind attributable to the timeframe of the church’s power.
On the wall face, both in terms of the colour of the bricks and the pattern, we can see the interruption of the 17th-century curtain wall and the beginning of the 19th-century curtain wall: the 17th-century curtain wall, lacking mortar joints also because it was not affected by restoration work for many years, is light-coloured, with a prevalence of yellow bricks alternating with pinkish bricks, mainly laid laterally, regularly punctuated with header bricks. The 19th-century curtain wall, pinkish, with purplish joint mortar, has a regular pattern with alternating lateral and header bricks, known as the “Gothic style”.
2. Plaque commemorating the 19th century restoration work on Viale delle Mura Aurelie