Rome / Domus Aurea

There is a well known legend about ancient Rome that the hated emperor Nero "fiddled while Rome burned" some historians say that he didn't play the violin but sang like a madman while watching Rome burn.

Today we found out that neither of those were true.
An archaeologist discovered that Nero wasn't even in Rome while it was burning.
The archaeologist took us on a tour of the "Domus Aurea" which is latin for "golden house".It was unbeleiveably enourmous! It contained rooms upon rooms upon rooms, hundreds of them, 3 mile-long porticos, retractable ceilings of ivory inlay, and, in the atrium, a 115-foot (35-meter) statue of Nero in the buff (naked) modeled on the Colossus of Rhodes. the palace was painted in gold leaf and as guests entered the palace they were sprinkled from above with perfume and rose petals.

It was known as the mad emperor's pleasure palace. Not anymore though.Archaeologists are currently excavating the remains of the palace after 2,000 years of being buried which is why we're here in hard-hats. (That's dad falling out of the picture on the right.)After Nero suicided in 68 AD, the people of Rome took back the area of Nero's Garden and built the Colosseum on it.