The Visit
The Visit
The guided tour lasts approx. 1hr. depending on group size. For non Italian speakers headsets can be provided with commentary in English, French or German. For other languages such as Dutch, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Portuguese, Hebrew or Hungarian written guides are available at no extra cost. Also, if booked in advance, provisions can also be made for wheelchair users, the blind and deaf and dumb.
u reservation the premises are accessible to disabled people in wheelchairs, blind and deaf-mutes.
Our animal friends are allowed as long as they are on a leash. The ban on access to the public gardens, in front of our entrance, refers to owners who would like to let their dogs stop in the children’s playground, the ban does not apply to those who cross them to go to Narni Sotterranea.
Our journey
Our journey starts under what was once St. Dominic’s convent, the entrance is in a XIIth century church, discovered in 1979. This church still preserves some of the most ancient frescos of
the city. Through a passage in the masonry we enter into a large room with a roman cistern, which is probably the remains of a roman house, or “domus”. Then, through a long narrow passage, we reach a large dark room which was the Tribunal of the Inquisition, where the accused heretics were put on trial. Several documents, discovered in the municipal and Vatican Archives and even Trinity
College in Dublin, together with traces left on the masonry by the torture instruments, prove the existence of these trials.
The Cell
A little cell, unique in Italy, is covered in strange graffiti and is testimony to the pain and suffering endured by those who were imprisoned there awaiting trial . One of these prisoners left a message
hidden in a graphic code that still today has’nt been completely decoded. A photogaphic exhibition shows the instruments used by the tribunal to extort confessions from those accused of heresy.
