Mausoleum of Augustus Wheelchair Accessible Tours

The Mausoleum of Augustus wheelchair accessible tours, also known as Augusteo, is a mighty funerary monument located near the River Tiber and the Ara Pacis, in Campo Marzio area, in the ancient heart of Rome.

It is considered the largest circular tomb in the ancient world.

The monument consisted of a cylindrical body covered in blocks of travertine, in the center of which a door opened to the South preceded by a short staircase; near the entrance, perhaps on pillars, were the bronze tablets engraved with the Res Gestae, or the Emperor's autobiography, the text of which is transcribed on the wall of the nearby Ara Pacis Museum.

Touring Mausoleum of Augustus

Augustus was inspired by the Hellenistic-style tomb of Alexander the Great, which he had visited in Alexandria, also circular in plan, as well as the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, built around 350 BC in honor of King Mausolus, but also to the Etruscan tombs.

The tomb first housed the remains of Marcus Claudius Marcellus, the nephew of Augustus who died in 23 BC, whose inscription on the marble slab was discovered in 1927, together with Augustus mother, Atia minor, whose inscription is shown on the same marble by Claudius Marcellus.

Then followed Marco Vipsanio Agrippa, inseparable friend of Octavian, then Drusus Major, Lucius and Gaius Caesar.

Augustus was buried in 14, followed by Drusus Minor, Germanicus, Livia and Tiberius.

We do not know if Vespasian and Claudius were buried here.

Caligula placed the ashes of his mother Agrippina and brothers Nerone Cesare and Drusus Cesare.

Later the remains of the other sister, Giulia Livilla, were brought there.

Nero, like the daughter of Augustus, Giulia Elder, was excluded like her for unworthiness from the dynastic tomb.

The last to be buried inside the Mausoleum was Nerva, in 98 AD.

His successor, Trajan, was in fact cremated and his ashes were placed in a golden urn at the foot of Trajan's Column.