Roman Theatre Museum

Historic · AlfamaLisbon,Portugal

A marble theatre of AD 57 cut into a Lisbon hillside, built over and forgotten for centuries, now walked down into from the street above.

The Roman Theatre Museum lets you walk down through modern floors into the seating of a theatre cut into this hillside, and out onto its stage. Rome founded Olisipo on this hill, and in AD 57 the theatre was rebuilt in marble brought from the Alentejo and stone from the Sintra hills. The work was paid for by Caius Heius Primus, a former slave freed by an important family, who had grown rich and had his own name cut into the inscription across the stage front, beside the emperor Nero's. For most of the two thousand years since, this was invisible. The theatre went out of use, the slope was built over, and Lisbon lived on top of it without knowing. Excavation has run in stages, so what you walk down into is the part that has been cleared rather than the whole building. The museum above was designed not to touch the ruin: modern floor and concrete stop wherever Roman stone begins, and the joins are visible as you descend. What you can stand inside is only the theatre. The rest of Roman Olisipo is still under the streets you walked in on.

Worth knowing

Good to know

The door is on Rua de São Mamede, below the cathedral — people look for it on the cathedral square and give up; it is down the hill on a narrow street with a plain modern front.
Allow forty minutes, not a morning — this is a small municipal museum built around one excavation, and its value is the walk down into the ruin rather than a long circuit of displays.
Find the inscription blocks — five of the surviving stones are on display, and they carry both the emperor's name and the name of the freed slave who paid for the rebuilding.
Look at where Roman stone meets modern concrete — the museum was designed to sit above the dig without touching it, so the joins are visible and tell you what was found and what was added.
The Roman city continues under the Baixa — this theatre is the part you can stand inside, and the rest of Olisipo still lies buried under the streets around it.

Things to do

1
Walk down into the seating
Follow the route from the modern entrance down through the building until you are standing on the excavated tiers. The slope you are on is the original cut into the hill, and the audience sat here facing the river. It is the only place in Lisbon where you can stand inside a Roman public building rather than look at a fragment of one.
2
Look up from the stage
Stand on the stage floor and look back at the seating and then at the modern city rising behind it. Houses, a road and a museum sit on top of the theatre, and the layers are visible in one glance. The rest of Roman Lisbon still lies under the city in the same way, but unexcavated.