The Octagonal Hall
Concrete dome before the Pantheon — Nero's architectural revolution.
Rabax63 — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Cristiano64 — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Unknown authorUnknown author — Public domain · MumblerJamie — CC BY-SA 2.0
After Rome's great fire (64 AD) Nero built himself the Golden House: a colossal pleasure palace spreading gold, ivory and marble over hills, with a rotating dining hall — Romans hated it as they hated him, and his successors erased it deliberately: burying it as foundations for their baths, raising the Colosseum on its lake. Burial saved it: its halls survive under the Oppian hill, descended today in hard hats on guided tours through cold dark corridors. The visit is true archaeological adventure: enormous vaults with original frescoes — the grotesques to which Raphael and friends dropped on ropes in wonder, fathering all Renaissance ornament — climaxing in the Octagonal Hall with its concrete dome preceding the Pantheon's, while VR headsets rebuild the splendour over the ruins: among the world's most successful uses of the technology on antiquity. Tours run limited (mostly weekends) in a living restoration site — advance booking is its absolute law.
Concrete dome before the Pantheon — Nero's architectural revolution.
The frescoes the Renaissance roped down to, fathering an age's ornament.
The splendour rebuilding over the ruins before your eyes.
Via della Domus Aurea, 00184 Rome
ColosseumNothing prepares you for the first moment: you step out of the metro and the gre4 minutes walk4.7
The Borgia Stair and the Vicus SceleratusA vaulted stone stair in the Monti district that passes beneath the old Borgia f5 minutes walk4.2
Arch of ConstantineThe largest and most complete surviving Roman triumphal arch: twenty-one metres 5 minutes walk4.7
Fountain of Piazza della Madonna dei MontiA late sixteenth-century fountain in a small square at the heart of Rome's Monti7 minutes walk4.6
The Basilica of MaxentiusThe largest building in the Roman Forum, of which three enormous vaults of concr7 minutes walk4.6Looking for halal food near Domus Aurea (Nero's Golden House)? There are several options nearby, from Moroccan and Indian kitchens to quick casual spots and places with a view. Confirm the halal status and opening hours before you go — these can change.
Hotel BaroccoA four-star hotel looking directly onto Piazza Barberini and Bernini's Triton Fo19 minutes walk · $$$$4.9The St. Regis RomeRome's oldest grand hotel and its most historic: opened in January 1894 as the G17 minutes walk · $$$$4.8When Renaissance explorers cut holes into the buried halls they took them for caves — grotte — naming their fantastical decorations (plant-animal-fancy hybrids) grotteschi: cave art. Raphael copied them into the Vatican and they swept Europe's palaces — the world's word grotesque memorialising this beautiful misunderstanding.
Literally above it: the park entrance on the facing Oppian hill — but tickets are wholly separate and the tour slotted. The wise order: Colosseum and Forum morning, Domus afternoon on its booked slot — Nero and his enemies' full day.