The mistery of a Pyramid in Rome
In Rome it became fashionable to create magnificent tombs after Octavianus (later emperor Augustus) conquered Egypt in the year 30 BC. Caius Cestius, an influent political man in the last years of the Republic in Rome, decided to build for hiimself a tomb in the shape of the Aegyptian pyramids and the monument was included in the walls that sorround the city fron the II century AD built by the emperor Aurelianus. The pyramid of Cestius has been closed for centuries, but recently the Archeological authority in Rome decide to explore the interior of the monument and discoverered a "camera sepulcralis" ( the real sepulchre) with magnificent paintings of winged Victories with triumphal crowns in their hands. Nearby there is the Via Ostiense Museum located in one of the exit of the ancient Roman walls( Porta S. Paolo) on the road that connected the capital of the Empire to te city port of Ostia.
A few hundred yards from the pyramid there is the so called Cimitero degli Inglesi which, during the Papal state of the Church, was the resting place of non catholic persons. The cemetery, a wonderful place of quiet and peace, has the tomb of the English poet Shelley. A place to visit in religious silence away from the caotic traffic of the nearby Via Ostiense.