Bathhouse art

The Aula Ottagona is both the most atmospheric branch of Rome's Museo Nazionale Romano and the only one that's admission-free

The only bit of the excellent Rome National Museum that's free is this huge brick room left over from the ancient Baths of Diocletian, a huge complex of halls and buidlings that has since been infested by monasteries, government government buildings, and the Michelangelo-designed Santa Maria degli Angeli church.

MNR Branches
Palazzo Massimo
Palazzo Altemps
Baths of Diocletian
Aula OttgonaInside, the Aula Ottagona—the inventively named "Octagonal Hall"—displays just a few, but very choice examples of oversized, 2nd-century BC sculptures that hail from various bathhouses across Rome. The weird metal netting of a dome inside is left over from when this room did duty as a planetarium.

This hidden room of statues is also convenient for being right around the corner from Rome's otherwise inconveniently located main tourist office.

Via Romtia (between Via Cernia and Via Parigi, just north of Piazza della Repubblica)
tel. +39-06-3996-7700, www.archeorm.arti.beniculturali.it
Closed Mondays