Entrance to the Pantheon in Rome will be paid

ROME. Visitors to the Pantheon, one of the best-preserved ancient monuments, will have to purchase an entry ticket starting in May 2018 if they are not going to pray there, the Italian Ministry of Culture and Tourism said.

The church is a huge cylindrical temple, the beautifully preserved external wall of which supports a huge dome with a diameter of 43 meters with a round hole at the top - attracted 7.4 million visitors in 2017.

A ticket will cost 2 euros per person. The introduction of the entrance fee to the Pantheon shows a desire to squeeze more profit from the cultural values of Italy. The ministry also said that tourist entrances will be suspended during religious services.

Part of the proceeds from the sale of tickets will go to the maintenance of the site where the Roman statesman Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa ordered a temple in honor of Emperor Augustus around 27 BC. The current Pantheon shape and six-meter-thick walls date back to the reign of Emperor Hadrian, who came to power in 117 AD. The building survived the attacks of the barbarians and turned into a Christian church in 609.

Among the buried there is a Renaissance artist, Raphael and two Italian kings.

Caring for art and architecture dating back thousands of years has long been a problem for Italy, which is responsible for more UNESCO World Heritage Sites than any other country and has long-standing problems of bureaucracy and inadequate public funding.

Lisa Fargo