Golden House of Nero Tour

Tour overview

Experience the Golden House of Nero (Domus Aurea) Tours Itinerary

The Domus Aurea is one of the many wonders of ancient Rome. It is indeed, the luxurious palace built by Nero, the Roman Emperor after the great fire ravaged Rome in 64 AD.

Its name in Latin means the House of Gold and was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in the year 1980.

The Basics

64 AD Rome was on fire. The devastating fury of the flames destroys the center of Rome. The citizens are destroyed by the tragedy but the emperor NERO takes advantage of the situation to have a huge new residence built.

For a long time, it was thought that nothing was left. But one day a Roman boy fell by chance into a hole and found himself in a beautifully frescoed cave. He was in the middle of the Renaissance and every artist wanted to let himself fall with a strange scaffolding in that strange cave. Raffaello and Michelangelo included.

The walls of the much-admired cave are painted with chimeras, men, plants and animals that intertwine creating a decorative motif. These are the famous grotesques, filmed during the Renaissance by all the major artists. These also decorate the ceiling of the UFFIZI corridor.

It had an area of ​​about 250 hectares within the Palatine, Esquiline and Celio and most of it was occupied by gardens, with fountains, statues, forests, vineyards and a lake on which the Colosseum was later built. There was also a colossal bronze statue of 35 meters representing Nero, the Colossus Neronis, which was in front of the main entrance of the palace, on the Palatine.

The Colossus was later adapted with the heads of successive emperors and was moved by Hadrian near the Flavian Amphitheater, which took the name of Coliseum in the Middle Ages, like this statue. The real villa of Nero was still in the imperial palaces of the Palatine.

The Domus Aurea was covered with pure gold and had ceilings decorated with semi-precious stones, ivory, paintings and beautiful mosaics.

After the death of Nero, the Domus Aura was stripped of its coverings and was completely buried under new buildings, for example, the Baths of Titus and Baths of Trajan and Emperor Vespasian has used the space of the artificial lake for the construction of the Flavian Amphitheater.

Things to Know Before You Go

• Nero’s Golden House is one of the active archeological sites according to UNESCO
• There is a multimedia VR Tour inside the cave. Therefore, you will be easier to imagine how the building was stood in the past
• You will need to walk around the site often. Therefore, use comfortable shoes.
• The site is not accessible using wheelchairs or strollers.

How to Get There: You can take Metro B to Coliseum stop. The address is situated on Domus Aurea, 1-00.184 Rome, Italy