hehe Rome is magical...
that is an Egyptian obelisk that was stolen at the time of Mussolini also you can find Ethiopian obelisks that are in debate to return back for years between the 2 countries...the problem seems to be who is going to pay for the transportation ...hahaha this are tons heavy structures :P
the not "ancient" art is mainly done during the kingdom of Italy, that's why they look so elegant...actually it was a movement all over Europe where they competed with each others on who is more majestic till eventually they killed each others in world wars..lol and by the way the wars never ended they just took a different "form"...Europeans were never united even though attempts to reconciliation across history were made since Charle Magne but it was always due to necessity and not a real belief...
the french don't like the italians ..the italians don't like the french...both of them don't like the germans...the germans don't like the british ..(particularly these days with brexit) and so on and so forth you will find many conflicts both externally and internally ... If it wasn't for the Church they would be still at it like in the Romans time..lol
Hey thanks for the info on the Obelisks. They were one of the more surprising things to find in Rome.