Italy: Rome reopens Palatine Museum

Rome: The Palatine Museum has reopened to the public, after an extended closure under Italy’s covid-19 regulations, with new opening hours.

The Museo Palatino, which houses sculptures, fragments of frescoes and archaeological material discovered on the Palatine Hill, is now open Monday to Friday from 10.30-16.00, with last entrance at 15.30.

Housed in the former Monastery of the Visitation, built in 1868 on the remains of Domitian’s palace, the new Antiquario Palatino was established in the 1930s by the archaeologist Alfonso Bartoli.

The two-storey museum, which was completely restructured in the 1990s, documents the history of the Palatine Hill from the origins of Rome to the advent of the Roman empire in the first century BC.

The museum contains treasures from the era of Augustus, Rome’s first emperor, as well as precious mosaics and paintings from the Neronian Domus Transitoria. The Palatine Hill is included in the entry ticket for the Colosseum.