Nero’s Rome: A Guide to the Infamous Emperor with Context

Rome’s fifth emperor, Nero, transformed the city’s layout, ensuring its financial success for generations to come. Yet his legacy is tinged with controversy.

On this walking tour with Veronica Iacomi – an archaeologist, guide, and Context Travel expert – you’ll visit Nero’s residence, perhaps the most splendid and lavish ever conceived. While few traces of Nero remain, the enormous palace where Nero lived, the Domus Aurea (or ‘the Golden House’), is sure to stay with you.

Starting opposite Oppio Caffè on Oppian Hill, one of the Seven Hills of Rome, you’ll make your way through Parco del Colle Oppio (a public park filled with ruins), and past the Colosseum before ending the tour at Circus Maximus, an ancient Roman entertainment venue.

Along the way, you’ll take in several places associated with the controversial figure, and learn about Nero’s desire for absolute, centralized, and independent power. You’ll find out how he was blamed for the disastrous fire of Rome in 64 AD, and hear about the resistance he faced when trying to introduce more Hellenistic Greek culture to Rome and the Empire.

On this tour, you’ll:

• Take in the majestic Baths of Trajan, created when Nero’s successors Titus and Trajan remade the bathhouses in the Domus Aurea
• Learn how the Roman emperor Trajan and his famous architect, Apollodorus from Damascus, constructed meaningful new public spaces
• Get to know Maecenas, a rich and important patron of poets and artists, whose properties were absorbed into the Domus Aurea when it was built
• Gaze upon the Seven Halls Cistern, which provided water to the Baths of Trajan, and hear about its transformation into a luxurious villa, complete with mosaic and marble floors in the 4th century
• Hear how the disastrous fire of 64 AD burnt 7 of the city’s 14 districts, almost completely destroying 3 of them and freeing up prime real estate
• Become aware of just how immense Nero’s residence was (hint, it was five times as large as the Vatican City!)
• Find out about the huge artificial lake Nero had built on a naturally flat valley where the Colosseum now stands
• Discover how Nero added an additional branch to one of the two new aqueducts built in Rome under Claudius
• Be shocked by Nero’s dark side, as you meet the man who ordered his own mother’s assassination

By the end of this tour, you’ll have a deeper understanding of one of the most discussed Ancient Roman rulers. You’ll also be better equipped to decide whether he was the oppressive ruler that many believe him to be, or a visionary who created an architectural masterpiece.