Pompeii Tour with Local Guide & Skip-the-Line Entrance

Highlights

• Authorized Local Guide
• Skip-the-Line Access
• Immersive Experience

What's included

Itinerary

1. 1

   Archaeological Park of Pompeii

   2h

   Pompeii is now considered one of the most important historical sites in the world due to the way in which volcanic ash has preserved the city and its inhabitants. This gives historians and archaeologists a clear picture of life in the Roman Empire some 2,000 years ago. The first excavations date back to the 18th century and after about 250 years, 75% of the site has been brought to light. Walking through the streets of the city, one gets the impression that time has never passed and that the eruption of the volcano is near. The tour begins by appointment near the entrance to the ruins and a few meters from the station and car parks. The duration is two hours and the tour includes: Entrance ticket; Priority service - skip the line for entry; Local guide service At the end of the guided tour there is the possibility of remaining inside the excavations.

2. 2

   Casa del Menandro

   15min

   This large house was affected by complex building events and represents the typical example of the home of a high-ranking family. The atrium is frescoed with scenes from the Iliad and the Odyssey. The peristyle is of the "rhodium" type, with the northern side being higher. The house owes its name to a portrait of Menander, an Athenian playwright, placed in the porch. The house has a small thermal district below which there is an underground room, perhaps a cellar, in which a chest with 118 pieces of silverware was found, now exhibited in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples. This treasure had been hidden before the restoration work began and was the family service. The pottery included forms for pouring wine, but above all plates and cups to be used during banquets. On the southern side you reach the rustic quarter, where the reconstruction of a wagon is exhibited.

3. 3

   Lupanar

   10min

   In the brothel the prostitutes, mostly Greek and Oriental slaves, practiced their profession for between two and eight asses (a cup of wine cost one). The building has two floors: on the upper floor there are the owners' and slaves' homes, on the lower floor five rooms, all equipped with a built-in bed, are arranged on either side of the corridor that connects the two entrances on the ground floor. The rooms were closed by a curtain. At the end of the corridor, under the stairwell, you can see a latrine. On the walls of the central corridor, small pictures with erotic depictions told customers about the activities that took place. The lupanare takes its name from the Latin term lupa to designate the prostitute.

4. 4

   Foro de Pompeya

   20min

   The Civil Forum represents the center of daily life in the city, all the main public buildings for the administration of the city and justice, for business management and commercial activities overlook it. The square of the Forum originally had the appearance of a simple open area of more or less regular shape, in rammed earth, on the western side of which was the Sanctuary of Apollo while the eastern side featured a row of shops. The Forum was profoundly modified between the III-II century. B.C. when the shape of the square was regularized, surrounded by arcades and the bottom paved with tuff slabs. The axis of the square became the facade of the Temple of Jupiter, placed in line with Vesuvius. At the beginning of the imperial age the Forum was again paved with travertine slabs; some slabs, no longer in their original location, have the recess to accommodate the bronze letters that belonged to a large inscription.

5. 5

   Lupanar

   10min

   The brothels were, throughout the Roman era, the places assigned to mercenary sexual pleasure, or real houses of tolerance. Some are still visible in the ruins of ancient Pompeii.

6. 6

   Stabian Baths (Terme Stabiane)

   10min

   The Terme Stabiane are a thermal complex from the Roman era, buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 and rediscovered following the archaeological excavations of ancient Pompeii: of its kind, it is the oldest building in the city

Before you go

Location