A French diplomat's bequest funded the idea as early as 1660, but decades of wrangling, including a scrapped plan to crown the steps with an equestrian statue of Louis XIV that scandalized papal Rome, delayed construction until architects Francesco de Sanctis and Alessandro Specchi finally built the 135-step staircase between 1723 and 1725.
It climbs the steep Pincian slope from Piazza di Spagna, named for the Spanish embassy to the Holy See at its base, up to the French-patronized church of Trinita dei Monti at the top, a deliberate diplomatic balancing act built into stone between two rival powers. At the foot of the steps, Pietro Bernini's Barcaccia fountain, shaped like a sinking boat, is said to commemorate a flood that once stranded a boat on this exact spot. English poet John Keats died in 1821 in the rose-colored house immediately to the right of the steps, now a small museum, having come to Rome for his health only to succumb to tuberculosis within sound of the fountain outside his window.
