It's a difficult question for me to answer—the places I would list would either be the obvious ones you'll find on most tourist lists (the four major basilicas, the Vatican Museums, the Flavian Amphitheater) or places that I would want to take you myself, so I could show you what you needed to see.

Actually, any place I tell you to go in Rome I would want to take you myself, because it's too easy to miss something (table of the Last Supper, anyone? How many people miss that in the Basilica of John Lateran?) or because you'll probably have some silly guide who tells you something absurd, like that no martyrs died in the Colosseum.

There is one place, however, I would always recommend to someone visiting the Rome—something that often escapes the tourist lists, and a place where most of the guides are pretty legit (I've only had one bad one, and that was almost ten years ago).

The Scavi.

The Scavi refers to the excavations under St. Peter's Basilica. Only about 200 people get to go down there each day, so I recommend emailing the office a few months in advance and then praying like crazy.

While I can't go into every detail about the Scavi, I highly recommend John Walsh's book The Bones of Peter, which is the definitive book on the gripping story surrounding the excavations. George Weigel also dedicated a chapter in his book Letters to a Young Catholic to a portion of the story (reprinted here: The Scavi of St. Peter's and the Grittiness of Catholicism). Continue reading

• Joannie Watson is presently the Director of Adult Formation for the Diocese of Nashville.

Dr Longhurst works at the Musei Vaticani in Rome as a researcher and scholar, covering theology and the visual arts, theological aesthetics, religion and the arts, and sacred art and architecture. Continue reading

St Peter's is a magnificent building, containing superb works of art; however its size - not to mention the size of the crowds - can be so overwhelming, visitors don't set foot in another church for the rest of their visit.

And that's a shame, because for 1600 years, building churches is what Rome did.

If you wanted your church to get noticed, you had to make it pretty extraordinary, which is why today, there are churches built into and over Roman ruins, decorated with human bones, and hung with museum-quality art.

Here are our 10 favourite churches in Rome. Some are well known; most are off the tourist trail; but you won't have to queue at a single one.

FOR ANCIENT RUINS

Visit Basilica di San Clemente

Rome is like millefeuille pastry, where the past is piled layer upon layer. Stick a shovel in the ground and you are literally digging up history.

The 12th-century Basilica di San Clemente, for instance, sits above a 4th-century church, built in turn above a 2nd-century pagan temple and a 1st-century Roman house. What makes San Clemente special is that here you can explore one layer after another.

Take a walk around the street-level basilica first: particularly lovely is the striking mosaic showing Christ on a crucifix that turns into a living tree.

Take the stairs on the right side down to the fourth century church, damaged beyond repair during a Norman attack in the 11th century. The frescoes you see depict scenes from the life of Saint Clement, and are 1000 years old.

From here, another set of stairs takes you down to the shrine of the Persian god Mithras, whose altar depicts the god slaying a bull. The sound of running water comes from drains dating back to the Roman republic. Continue reading

Sources

• Stuff
• Image: Huffington Post