Domus Romane of Palazzo Valentini

Domus Romane of Palazzo Valentini

A fascinating underground journey into the Rome of the imperial age, the true nerve center of the cultural and political life of the city.

In front of Trajan’s Forum, during the excavation and redevelopment works in 2005, between five and seven meters below the sixteenth-century Palazzo Valentini, an extraordinary archaeological area came to light consisting of two patrician residences dating back to the 4th century AD, equipped with a private spa area and belonging to influential families of the time.

Through the accurate multimedia reconstruction and computer graphics curated by Piero Angela, Paco Lanciano and a team of technicians and experts, since 2007 you can relive the magnificence of the Domus that belonged to the noble Roman families who had established their residence there. The wall structures, the environments, the baths, the decorations and the furnishings are reborn and accompany you on an evocative virtual journey inside imperial Rome.

The installation of transparent flooring also allows you to walk as if suspended on this extraordinary site and, through plays of light, virtual reconstructions, graphic effects and films, you can admire the environments, completely immersing yourself in the atmosphere of ancient Rome.

The visit begins from the thermal complex of the Piccole Terme di Traiano, in whose central swimming pool the hosts could relax after the gym. The swimming pools were equipped with a private water system, a luxury that only the wealthiest citizens could afford. We continue entering the laconicum, a sauna in which the temperature reached 50 degrees, thanks to a furnace fueled by wood burned by slaves. The other bath tubs: the calidarium, the tepidarium and the frigidarium, were used to adapt the body to different levels of heat. The marble head of the goddess Minerva dating back to the 1st century AD was found in the frigidarium. which was already an antiquity for its time.

From the spa you can directly access the patrician house and one of its living rooms whose flooring and walls are covered in fine polychrome marble.

Over the centuries, the original appearance of the rooms has been modified by medieval and Renaissance walls which, however, allow us to reconstruct an important piece of the ancient topography of this area. Furthermore, the area of ​​the private baths was full of debris due to the collapse of the upper floor, perhaps due to an earthquake that occurred in 538 AD. In fact, there are horizontal fractures in the marble slabs and traces of a fire that probably started after the earthquake.