Obelisks

Obelisks has been a part of Rome for the last 2000 years or so. Here's a modern example from the fascist era (see also here (same one) and here). For an ancient obelisk look here.

"Monarchs, too, have entered into a sort of rivalry with one another in forming elongated blocks of this stone, known as "obelisks," and consecrated to the divinity of the Sun. The blocks had this form given to them in resemblance to the rays of that luminary, which are so called in the Egyptian language.

Mesphres, who reigned in the City of the Sun, was the first who erected one of these obelisks, being warned to do so in a dream: indeed, there is an inscription upon the obelisk to this effect; for the sculptures and figures which we still see engraved thereon are no other than Egyptian letters."

Pliny the Elder - Naturalis Historia (the Natural History) XXVI.14
Translated by John Bostock, H.T. Riley