From the New York Post, May 13, 2023:
It is a high drama that could be torn from an Italian opera: Her Royal Highness Princess Rita Boncompagni Ludovisi had just 30 minutes to leave her art-filled palace in Rome last month amid an ugly feud with her stepsons — all of them princes.
As she gathered her possessions, rattled and sleep-deprived, she rushed to a back entrance of the Casino dell’Aurora and tripped on a flight of marble stairs, breaking two ribs and her clavicle.
But she got up, taking with her the family of Ukrainian refugees she had invited to share the palace, leaving behind the masterpieces by Caravaggio and Michelangelo and the frescoed ceilings which rival the Vatican’s.
Outside, one of the three stepsons held court as he celebrated a victory over the Princess — even though he is a wanted man in the US, accused of being a wife-beater.
But it is not an opera, and the princess is in fact a 73-year-old Texan former Playboy model and businesswoman, who had been granted the 400-year-old home for life by her late husband, Prince Nicolò Boncompagni Ludovisi, in his will.
Now Princess Rita is telling The Post how she has not only lost her home but is essentially penniless, while the palace, one of Rome’s greatest repositories of treasures, lies unoccupied and in legal limbo, with her three stepsons hoping to be given it later this month....
....MUCH MORE
Previously (don't judge me), December 2021:
Attention Art Fans: Large Caravaggio For Sale, Asking $552 Million
Villa included....
January 2022: UPDATE: "Villa Aurora: Rome property fails to sell for €471m at auction"
