Bardo National Museum

The Bardo National Museum, located in Tunis, Tunisia, is renowned for its extensive collection of Roman mosaics and artifacts from various civilizations, including Punic, Roman, early Christian, Islamic, and Ottoman periods. Housed in a 19th-century Beylical palace, the museum offers visitors a comprehensive journey through Tunisia’s rich history, showcasing artifacts such as the Virgil Mosaic, the Triumph of Neptune, and the Ulysses and the Sirens mosaic. The museum also features a collection of Hellenistic and Punic statuary, providing insights into ancient North African life. Visitors can explore the museum’s diverse collections, which reflect the country’s historical richness and uniqueness. The museum is open Tuesday through Sunday and offers various services, including guided tours, audio guides, temporary exhibitions, a museum shop, and a cafeteria. It is located at 10 Avenue 2 Mars 1934, Le Bardo, Tunis, Tunisia.

Planning your visit

The Bardo holds the largest collection of Roman mosaics in the world, and seeing them here is different from seeing Roman art anywhere else — these were floors, lifted whole from villas across Roman Africa, and they are displayed at a scale that fills entire walls and rooms. The Virgil mosaic, the Triumph of Neptune and the Ulysses panel are the best known. The setting adds to it: a nineteenth-century Beylical palace with carved ceilings and tiled courtyards, itself worth the visit.

Bookable options nearly always combine the Bardo with the other fixtures of a Tunis day, because they cluster naturally: the Punic and Roman ruins at Carthage, the blue-and-white clifftop village of Sidi Bou Saïd, and the medina with the Zitouna Mosque. Private and small-group guided tours cover that circuit with a guide who can connect the mosaics to the sites they came from. Transfers run from Sousse and Hammamet for visitors staying on the coast. Current departures are below.