Villa Torlonia Bunker

Beneath the greenery of Villa Torlonia lie reminders of a dark chapter in Rome's history. Between 1940 and 1943, Mussolini had two air-raid shelters and an underground bunker built beneath what was, at the time, his family estate. Guided 1½-hour tours take you down into these bare underground chambers, complete with anti-gas doors and air-filtration systems. The bunker, whose 4m-thick walls lie 6m below the Casino Nobile, was still being worked on when the Duce was arrested on 25 July 1943.