Chiesa di Sant'Anna a Tor Tre Teste, Religious site near Via Prenestina, Rome, Italy
Chiesa di Sant'Anna a Tor Tre Teste is a deconsecrated church on the seventh kilometre of Via Prenestina, with a rough grey-brown stucco facade, a single rectangular doorway with dark wooden doors, and a pitched roof of weathered terracotta tiles. A slender brick bell tower with a crumbling top rises from the left end of the roof, and a low brick wall with three carved stone heads stands to the right. Inside, the single nave retains faint traces of wall paintings.
The church dates from the 12th century, when it was owned by the Basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano, as an epigraph on the adjacent tower attests. The canons of that chapter managed it until 1948, when the tower collapsed and the church was abandoned; services moved to the nearby army barracks. In 2012 it was annexed to the parish of San Cirillo Alessandrino.
The district takes its name from the three carved heads on the medieval tower beside the church, one of them a woman's face; the relief is thought to come from an ancient sarcophagus. Inside the single nave, faint traces of 12th- and 13th-century frescoes remain on the walls.
The building is not regularly open to the public and is no longer used for services. Visitors should check ahead to see if special viewing arrangements can be made.
Next to the church stands a medieval tower with a notable carved stone relief showing three human faces. This sculpture gave the entire district its name and represents a rare example of Roman ornamentation from that era.
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