Scavi Scaligeri

Beneath the courtyard of the law courts, a few steps from Piazza dei Signori, lies an excavated slice of Verona going down through the medieval city to the Roman one.

It was found during building works in the 1980s and left open. Roman houses, mosaic floors, streets and drains sit below later Scaliger foundations, all under a modern roof.

Unusually, the space is used rather than merely displayed: it houses the city's international photography centre, and exhibitions are hung among the ruins. That makes it worth checking what is on -- and means opening follows the exhibition calendar rather than a museum's.

Stay on the walkways. They exist so that no one walks on Roman mosaic, and the archaeology below them is not barriered off in the way a museum case would be.

Photography rules follow whatever exhibition is installed -- often no photography at all, given the work on show. Ask rather than assume.

Do not touch the masonry or the mosaic edges.

Buying a ticket, or using the Verona Card, is what keeps an excavation of this kind open and staffed rather than sealed and backfilled.

Opening is tied to the exhibition programme, not to fixed museum hours. When no exhibition is installed the site is often closed entirely -- check before making the trip.

Admission is charged when an exhibition is on, and is generally covered by the Verona Card.

The entrance is on the Cortile del Tribunale, a minute from Piazza dei Signori and the Arche Scaligere.

Allow forty-five minutes to an hour, depending on the exhibition.

The site is underground, reached by stairs, with a lift available; the walkways themselves are level. Ask on arrival if step-free access matters.

Come for the exhibition as much as the ruins -- if you only want the archaeology, the Roman theatre's museum offers more.