Vatican Museums

This room contains artefacts found during excavations carried out in the Papal States during the nineteenth century and which entered the collections of the Profane Museum. Of particular note are the two tails of equestrian statues in gilded bronze, found in 1803 during the works for the construction of the bridge at Botte sul Fosso della Scheggia, on the border between Umbria and Marche; the remains of two bronze beds, found near Orte in June 1819; the two tondi of opus sectile flooring of the ships of the emperor Caligula, from Nemi, explored by Annesio Fusconi using a “diving bell” and, in particular, the ivory remains of a chryselephantine statue, discovered in 1824 in the villa of the Bruttii Praesentes in Sabina and acquired by Pope Gregory XVI on July 6, 1832.