Archaeological Complex Of The Roman Houses Of Caelium Hill In Rome, Italy Editorial Image

The room of the praying person in the Complex of the Roman Houses of Caelium Hill in Rome, Italy. The room, covered with frescoes, is named after the praying figure in the upper right. Below the Basilica of Saints John and Paul the archaeological area is located on top of Caelian Hill, one of the famous seven hills of Rome, long known as the home for some of Rome’s wealthiest elites. The earliest structures that make up the Case Romane del Celio date from the second century AD when the buildings at this site were part of an early roman domus or residential building for Rome’s upper class. At the beginning of the third century AD, the site was transformed into an insula or middle-class apartment block. Artisan shops took up the bottom floors with apartments above them, going along a small alley which still cuts through the site today. In the early 4th century, the site saw its another major transformation when the entire area was acquired by a wealthy family who combined all of the buildings into one large and elegant domus and decorated the house with beautiful frescos showing nature and pagan symbols. The current basilica of Saint Paul and John was built at the end of the 4th century AD exactly on top of the archaeological complex, site in which it was supposed the saints John and Paul had been buried, with other Christian martyrs like Crispus, Srispianus, and Benedicta.