Tourist attractions Castel Gandolfo

The catacombs were the private cemetery of Emperor Domitian’s niece Domitilla, and include an underground church.

These catacombs seem to have been excavated around a core of three mausoleums which are open to visitors.

This is a huge cemetery, where more than 500 000 people are buried, including all the 3C popes. Its main attraction is the extraordinary wall paintings of the Sacraments Room , dating from the end of the 2C or start of the 3C.

Founded by Constantine, the basilica was totally rebuilt during the Baroque period and 18C. Galilei’s façade gives access to a rather cold and solemn interior by Borromini and followers of Bernini. In contrast with the nave, the transept is awash wit..

Built by Caracalla in the year 212, these baths covered 11ha and could accommodate 1 600 people at any one time.The ruins of the caldarium a circular hall measuring 34m in diameter (formerly the hot baths), host opera events in summer.

The region, located in the Alban hills to the southeast of Rome, owes its name to the fortresses built here in the Middle Ages by noble families fleeing the anarchy which prevailed in Rome. Each of these settlements is built on the edge of an immense..

A necropolis grew up along this ancient road, created by Appius Claudius Caecus. It was made up of catacombs dug by the first Christians. During the week, Via Appia Antica is open to motor traffic as far as the mausoleum of Cecilia Metella; from ther..

This huge museum dedicated to Roman civilisation includes fine scale models which reconstruct Ancient Rome in miniature.

Built by Constantine on the site of St Paul’s tomb, the basilica was destroyed by fire in 1823 and then immediately rebuilt. The interior is breathtakingly grand. Marking the site of the Saint’s burial, the Gothic-style ciborium is an exercise in..

This electricity power station is an unusual setting to find sculpture from the Musei Capitolini collections. It displays around 400 objects from the 6C BC to the 1C AD, cheek-by-jowl alongside huge old diesel engines. Two such contrasting eras would..

Founded in the 4C and dedicated to St Clement, this is one of Rome’s earliest basilicas. Badly damaged in 1084 it was rebuilt, again on a basilical plan with three naves in the 12C. The upper basilica’s apse has extraordinarily colourful mosaicwork. ..

The most famous of Frascati's sumptuous villas, it is renowned for its gardens, embellished with terraces, paths, fountains and rock gardens.

EUR (Exposizione Universale di Roma) was the brainchild of Mussolini, designed to showcase Fascist modernity. Conceived in the 1930s as the first step in an expansion programme that envisaged extending Rome to the sea, this new district was developed..

Among the rich collections on show in this ethnographic museum, note in particular the sections devoted to Africa and Oceania.

Italian folk art and popular tradition collections are presented in this museum.

Grottaferrata has preserved its abbey, founded in the 11C by Greek monks.

A pleasant road winds its way between chestnut and oak woods, leading to Nemi, a delightfully situated little village on the shores of a lake of the same name. It then climbs towards Monte Cavo (949m), where once stood a temple to Jupiter. It was sub..

Piazza Marconi is the principal square in the EUR district. It is surrounded by museum buildings, including the Museum of Prehistory and Ethnography and the Museum of Folk Art and Traditions .

This building characterises the EUR district more than any other and is certainly its best known structure. Its imposing bulk has earned it the nickname “the square colosseum”.

Close to the baths, this church has a magnificent 9C mosaic and fine (if gory) 16C frescoes depicting massacres during the Counter-Reformation.