Ruins of ancient Nero’s Theater discovered under garden of future Four Seasons near Vatican

By NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press

ROME (AP) — Rome’s next luxury hotel has some very good bones. Archaeologists said Wednesday that the ruins of Nero’s Theater have been discovered under the garden of the future Four Seasons Hotel. Ancient Roman texts referred to the imperial but it never had been found. Archaeologists have been excavating deep under the walled garden of the Palazzo della Rovere since 2020 as part of planned renovations on the Renaissance building steps from the Vatican. The palazzo is home to an ancient Vatican chivalric order that leases the space to a hotel to raise money for Christians in the Holy Land. The order confirmed a Four Seasons was its next renter.