A Renaissance palace-turned-museum in Rome is displaying ancient artifacts that once
belonged to the city's noble families.
Close to some of Rome's most iconic landmarks, the pieces remain tucked away from the hustle
and bustle of the Italian capital.
NTD's Andrew Thomas has more.
The Colosseum, Trevi Fountain, and Spanish Steps are just a few of Rome's famous sites.
Among the landmarks, Roman antiquities sit quietly in Palazzo Altemps.
Tourist Francesca Sabatini was surprised by the calm atmosphere.
It's crazy.
It's like a hidden gem in the middle of Rome.
We're right next to Piazza Navona and there's two people in the museum with us, so it's
a beautiful break, a beautiful parenthesis in the heart of the city.
In a large square courtyard, statues rest in arches around the perimeter.
Inside, the Palazzo Altemps houses collections of antiquities from several Italian noble
families.
Museum director Chiara Giobbe explains how the museum shows a different side of Rome.
When you cross the threshold of the museum, you enter into this relaxing and beautiful
atmosphere, so it can be a chance to stop and enjoy the beauty of the ornamentation
and the works, and breathe in the art and culture outside of the usual well-known and
traveled tourist routes.
The museum hosts ancient sculptures discovered over the centuries.
Excavations in Rome have recovered the statue of Ares, the Greek god of war, with a baby
Ares playing around his ankles.
Another sculpture depicts Hermes.
Altogether there are nearly one million artifacts from archaeological digs around the city.
The Palazzo Altemps has about 70,000 visitors a year, so it's definitely not a museum that
gets a lot of visitors because it's outside of the usual routes of the tour operators.
I think when people come to Rome, they go to see just a few monuments and a few important
piazzas, and they don't have time to visit everything.
So our visitors are, above all, people who are passionate about art history and archaeology.
The artifacts at the museum are frequently loaned to museums around the world.
Archaeologists and academics can also apply for special access for their research.
Andrew Thomas, NTD News.
