Museo Nazionale del Palazzo Venezia

Housed in the Palazzo Venezia — the 15th-century palace from whose famous balcony Mussolini delivered his speeches to the crowds in the piazza below — this museum holds an important and undervisited collection of medieval and Renaissance applied arts: tapestries, armour, bronzes, ceramics, goldsmithery, wooden altarpieces, and medieval sculpture. The Sala del Mappamondo, where Mussolini had his working desk, is preserved. The palazzo itself was originally built for Cardinal Pietro Barbo (later Pope Paul II) and is one of the finest early Renaissance buildings in Rome, overlooking Piazza Venezia from a prime position. Included in the same ticket as the nearby Vittoriano. Consistently cited by rome.net and romeing.it as one of Rome's most overlooked museums given its central location.