Domus Aurea

[Koen G]

Wasn't the Domus Aurea rediscovered too late for our purpose? I remember that its discovery supposedly influenced the early renaissance.
I double checked on the wiki:

When a young Roman inadvertently fell through a cleft in the Esquiline hillside at the end of the 15th century, he found himself in a strange cave or grotto filled with painted figures.[18] Soon the young artists of Rome were having themselves let down on boards knotted to ropes to see for themselves.[50] The Fourth Style frescoes that were uncovered then have faded to pale gray stains on the plaster now, but the effect of these freshly rediscovered Grotesque[51] decorations was electrifying in the early Renaissance, which was just arriving in Rome.

When Raphael and Michelangelo crawled underground and were let down shafts to study them, the paintings were a revelation of the true world of antiquity.