Museu de Lisboa - Teatro Romano

The Museu de Lisboa - Teatro Romano reveals, on the slope of São Jorge Castle, one of the great remains of ancient Felicitas Iulia Olisipo. The theatre was built in the time of Emperor Augustus and remodelled in AD 57, during Nero’s rule. It is estimated to have held around four thousand spectators, a sign of the public importance of performances in the Roman city. Abandoned in the 4th century, it remained buried until 1798, when the ruins emerged during the reconstruction of Lisbon after the 1755 Earthquake. Only in the second half of the 20th century did the monument begin to be studied again through systematic archaeological campaigns. The present route brings together an exhibition area, an archaeological field and the ruins of the theatre, where parts of the orchestra, seating, stage front and stage can still be recognised. Between excavated stone and the urban fabric, the museum reveals a Lisbon older than the city’s own medieval memory.