Explore Rome

Villa Borghese is an 80-hectare landscape park on the Pincian Hill, laid out from 1606 for Cardinal Scipione Borghese and reshaped in later centuries. Its avenues lead past the Galleria Borghese, fountains and the Giardino del Lago, where the Temple of Aesculapius stands on an island and rowing boats can be hired.

St. Peter's Square is the plaza in front of St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, laid out by Gian Lorenzo Bernini in 1656–1667. Two curved colonnades, four columns deep, enclose an ancient Egyptian obelisk raised here in 1586 and two granite fountains; the Pope holds general audiences and blessings in the square.

The Galleria Borghese is an art museum in the Villa Borghese Pinciana, a villa built by Flaminio Ponzio in the early 17th century for Cardinal Scipione Borghese. It shows his collection in its original rooms, with Bernini sculptures such as Apollo and Daphne and David, Canova's reclining Paolina Borghese, and paintings by Caravaggio, Raphael and Titian.

St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City was built between 1506 and 1626 over the traditional burial place of Saint Peter. Bramante, Michelangelo and Carlo Maderno shaped the design; Michelangelo's dome rises over the papal altar and Bernini's bronze baldachin, and Bernini also framed the square with its colonnades. Michelangelo's Pietà stands in the first chapel on the right.

The Bioparco di Roma is a 17-hectare zoological garden on part of the former Villa Borghese estate. It opened in 1911 as the city zoo, laid out by Carl Hagenbeck with ditches instead of bars, and keeps about 1,100 animals of more than 200 species, among them Asiatic lions, giraffes and chimpanzees.

The Vatican Museums in Vatican City hold the art collections of the popes, begun by Pope Julius II in the early 16th century. The route leads through the classical sculptures of the Pio-Clementino Museum, the Gallery of Maps and the Raphael Rooms to the Sistine Chapel, whose ceiling and Last Judgement Michelangelo painted. About 20,000 of some 70,000 works are on display.

The National Etruscan Museum occupies Villa Giulia, the Renaissance villa built for Pope Julius III in 1551–1553. Its collection is devoted to the Etruscans and Faliscans of ancient central Italy and includes the terracotta Sarcophagus of the Spouses from Cerveteri and the Apollo of Veii, shown in rooms around the villa's courtyards and nymphaeum.

The Vatican Gardens cover about 23 hectares, roughly half of Vatican City, on the hill behind St. Peter's Basilica. Laid out from the Renaissance onwards, they combine formal parterres, woodland, fountains and sculptures with buildings such as the Casina of Pius IV and the Governor's Palace. Visits take place on guided tours booked through the Vatican Museums.

The Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls is one of Rome's four papal major basilicas, founded under Constantine over the traditional grave of the Apostle Paul on the Via Ostiense. After a fire in 1823 it was rebuilt on the old plan; inside are Arnolfo di Cambio's ciborium of 1285 and a frieze of mosaic portraits of the popes.

The Catacombs of Domitilla on Via delle Sette Chiese grew from 2nd-century burial grounds on land of the family of Flavia Domitilla into some 17 kilometres of galleries on several levels. Guided tours start in the semi-underground Basilica of Saints Nereus and Achilleus and continue past tombs decorated with frescoes.

The Catacombs of Callixtus on the Appian Way served as the official cemetery of the Church of Rome in the 3rd century, and about half a million people were buried here, among them sixteen popes. Guided tours of about 40 minutes lead through the galleries to the Crypt of the Popes and the crypt of Saint Cecilia.

Sant'Agnese fuori le mura is a basilica on Via Nomentana, built by Pope Honorius I in the 7th century over the tomb of the martyr Agnes and set below the level of the road. Its apse mosaic shows Agnes between two popes; guided tours lead into the catacombs beneath, and the complex includes the 4th-century Mausoleum of Santa Costanza.

The Catacombs of San Sebastiano are an underground Christian cemetery on the Via Appia Antica, beneath the 4th-century Basilica of San Sebastiano. Guided tours lead through galleries on several levels to the crypt of the martyr Sebastian, three 2nd-century pagan mausoleums with frescoes and stucco, and the Memoria Apostolorum of Peter and Paul.

The Appia Antica Archaeological Park protects the ancient Via Appia, the Roman road begun in 312 BC, with the tombs, aqueducts and villas along it in the countryside south-east of Rome. Visitors walk or cycle the stone-paved road between pines and cypresses, and enter sites such as the Mausoleum of Caecilia Metella, the Villa of the Quintilii and the Claudian aqueduct.

The Catacombs of Saints Marcellinus and Peter lie at the third mile of the ancient Via Labicana, today Via Casilina, and take their name from two martyrs buried here in 304. Booked guided tours show galleries with early Christian wall paintings; the same site includes the Mausoleum of Helena, built by Constantine for his mother.

Cinecittà is the film studio complex on Via Tuscolana, opened in 1937, where productions from Ben-Hur to Fellini's films were shot. Visitors enter by the historic gate to Cinecittà si Mostra, exhibitions on the studios' history and on film crafts in the Palazzina Presidenziale and Palazzina Fellini, and can join guided tours of the ancient Rome set.