Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres of Fourvière

The Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres of Fourvière occupy the western slope of the Fourvière hill at 17 Rue Cléberg, in the 5th arrondissement of Lyon, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of France. Lugdunum was founded in 43 BC and became the capital of the Roman Gauls, and this site preserves its best-known public buildings. The Great Theatre, dating from about 15 BC, is one of the oldest Roman theatres in France and seats thousands in a semicircle of stone tiers cut into the hillside. Beside it stands the smaller Odeon, built for music and poetry. Both are open to visitors for free, every day, and are still used for the Nuits de Fourvière festival from June to July. The museum, designed by architect Bernard Zehrfuss and built into the slope, is a concrete, spiral-ramped building holding mosaics, inscriptions, sculpture, bronzes and everyday objects, among them the Claudian Tablet and the Circus Mosaic. Galleries follow the story of the city from its founding to late antiquity. A visit takes about 1.5 to 2.5 hours, with at least an hour for the museum and time to walk the tiers of the theatres. The best views come from the upper rows of the Great Theatre, which look out over the rooftops of Lyon, and a low angle from the orchestra captures the full curve of the seating. The theatres are quietest early on weekday mornings and busiest during festival evenings; the museum is calm outside school holidays. Metro D to Vieux Lyon-Cathédrale Saint-Jean and then the F2 funicular to Minimes-Théâtres romains reaches the site in a few minutes. Opening hours vary by season and day, with the museum closed on Mondays.