To find catacombs, go to Rome, home of some of the oldest and longest burial underground tunnels in the world. "Hundreds of kilometers of catacombs run underneath the town and its outskirts," says ...

An integral part of daily life in ancient Rome, the baths gave citizens of all classes the chance to mingle, gossip and relax. They were viewed as fundamental to Roman civilization and an obvious ...

Roman worship was divided into the public and the private. Families would honor their household spirits while Rome had colleges of official priests to ensure that its actions met with divine ...

The Olympia hippodrome was of a size to allow 60 chariots to race at once. When the Romans conquered Greece in 146 BC they adopted the sport. The main venue for it in Rome was the Circus Maximus ...

Few of the world’s great cities share a pedigree and history as rich as Constantinople. Originally founded, according Greek mythology, by Byzas – son of the god Poseidon, the town once known as ...

during which emperors ruled as civilians from the city officially named New Rome but commonly called Constantinople (“Constantine’s city”) and founded originally as Byzantion (Byzantium in ...

With its mix of modern and ancient architecture, beautifully curated exhibitions, and the best wine bars, Rome will never give you the same experience twice. Between Vatican City, the Trevi ...

Theodora was the empress of the Eastern Roman Empire ... She was the daughter of the bear-keeper of the hippodrome in Constantinople (now Istanbul), and became an actress and a prostitute.

Al-Monitor is an award-winning media outlet covering the Middle East, valued for its independence, diversity and analysis. It is read widely by US, international and Middle East decision makers at the ...

Paul Magdalino, Roman Constantinople in Byzantine Perspective. The Memorial and Aesthetic Rediscovery of Constantine’s Beautiful City, from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance (Brill Research ...

The material, light tan and granular, had been a critical component of the Roman Empire, he said: the precursor to concrete, a mainstay of Roman infrastructure, including the aqueducts that ...

Recounting the time his family spent in a former Italian brothel, André Aciman’s new memoir, “Roman Year,” picks up where 1994’s “Out of Egypt” left off. By Aminatta Forna Aminatta ...