We recently featured an article where we took readers on a stroll along the Roman Forum. Now add this to your stroll as a new fascinating site just opened in the area: a first-century ramp which connected the opulent palaces of Roman emperors on the Palatine Hill with the temples, markets and courts of the Forum below.
The seven-level ramp, built by Emperor Domitian in the first century AD to serve as a majestic entrance into his palace, was only discovered in 1900 and opened to the public for the first time in late October.
This covered walkway was protected by huge walls to make the passage of emperors invisible to the people in the Forum. Visitors can now walk along this passage just like the emperors did and emerge on the Palatine Hill, where emperors built their huge residences, for a panoramic view of the Forum.
A temporary exhibition of ancient Roman archaeological artefacts and 17th-century art from Santa Maria Liberatrice, a church built at the foot of the Palatine Hill, is currently on view here until January 10.
According to ANSA, another restored section linked to the Clivus Victoriae ('slope of victory'), an ancient road climbing the Palatine Hill, is scheduled to open in March.
