Basilica of Saint Paul outside the Walls

Saint Paul was executed in Rome, and tradition holds that he was buried beside the road to Ostia, outside the city walls. Constantine built a first church over the grave, consecrated in 324; from 386 the emperor Theodosius replaced it with a vast basilica with a nave and four aisles that for a time was larger than old Saint Peter's. For almost 1,400 years it kept much of its original character, until 15 July 1823, when a workman repairing the roof gutters started a fire that destroyed nearly all of it.

What visitors see today is the 19th-century rebuilding, completed in 1840: the same five-aisled plan, about 132 metres long, with 80 columns marching down the nave under a wood and stucco ceiling, and windows of translucent alabaster that glow like stained glass. The scale and the cold perfection of the interior make it one of the most striking church spaces in Rome. Above the columns runs a band of mosaic roundels portraying every pope, a mosaic version of the painted series that ran through the old basilica.

Some older treasures survived. The mosaic on the triumphal arch dates from the 5th century, paid for by Galla Placidia, though heavily restored. Over the high altar stands a Gothic tabernacle by Arnolfo di Cambio of 1285. Behind the main entrance is the Byzantine bronze door commissioned in 1070 by a merchant of Amalfi and probably cast in Constantinople, with 56 engraved panels. Beneath the altar, excavations completed in 2006 exposed one side of a marble sarcophagus long held to contain the apostle's remains, and a marble slab inscribed PAULO APOSTOLO MART. On the south side is the cloister of 1205–1241 by the Vassalletto workshop, with paired columns of different shapes, some inlaid with gold and coloured glass mosaic — one of the finest medieval cloisters anywhere.

The basilica is one of Rome's four major papal basilicas and a Benedictine abbey church. It stands on Italian soil but belongs to the Holy See. Its Holy Door is opened only in jubilee years, and in October 2025 King Charles III attended an ecumenical service here and was made a confrater of the abbey.

Getting there

The basilica is on Via Ostiense in the south of Rome, about 5 km from the historic centre. Basilica San Paolo station on Metro Line B, also served by the Rome–Lido railway, is directly behind the church. The nearest airport is Rome Ciampino (CIA), about 12 km away.