In about 329 AD the Emperor Constantine had his mother Helena’s body buried in an imposing mausoleum adjoining a basilica he had himself built and dedicated to the martyrs Marcellinus and Peter, above the catacomb which preserved their remains at the third mile of the Via Labicana (today Via Casilina), in the imperial complex ‘Ad Duas Lauros’.
Today, 1690 years after the death of the Augusta, after the long and necessary restoration work that has rescued the remains from decline and decay, the Mausoleum of St. Helena and the adjoining Antiquarium have finally been returned to the community and reopened to the public, built in the interior of the small church and rectory dating from modern times – which form part of the complex – and conceived as a museum of its territorial context. The volume presents the results of the restoration of the Mausoleum and the installation of the Antiquarium, which involved a team of multidisciplinary experts and are the result the fruitful collaboration between the Soprintendenza Speciale Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio di Roma and the Pontificia Commissione di Archeologia Sacra.