Palazzo Barberini

Palazzo Barberini is one of Rome's most celebrated baroque palaces, built in the seventeenth century for the powerful Barberini family and completed under the patronage of Pope Urban VIII. The building itself is a landmark of Roman architecture, designed by a succession of the era's greatest talents including Carlo Maderno, Francesco Borromini, and Gian Lorenzo Bernini, whose competing visions shaped its grand staircases and ceremonial halls.

Today the palace houses the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica, a national collection spanning works from the thirteenth to the eighteenth century. Among its most prized possessions are Raphael's portrait La Fornarina, Hans Holbein the Younger's portrait of Henry VIII, and Pietro da Cortona's breathtaking ceiling fresco in the Gran Salone. The museum occupies a commanding position on the Quirinal Hill, and its rooms move visitors through centuries of Italian and European painting within one of the city's most architecturally significant buildings. Skip-the-line tickets are available, allowing direct entry without queuing at the door.