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New Vatican tours for blind and deaf

Visitors allowed to touch selected works

04 March, 15:13
New Vatican tours for blind and deaf

(ANSA) - Vatican City - The Vatican has said it is introducing new tours for the sight- and hearing-impaired.

Blind visitors will be allowed to touch "selected masterpieces" in the Vatican Museums with expert guides explaining the exhibits.

For the deaf, sign-language experts have been drafted in.

The "multi-sensory" tours will also have "olfactory" features.

The Vatican Museums, which include Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel, Raphael's famous Stanze and one of the world's largest art collections, are the biggest tourist draw in Italy, attracting some three million visitors a year.

Founded in 1506 by Pope Julius II around the astonishing ancient statuary group Laocoon, the Museums boast some of the world's leading collections of ancient Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Etruscan and Renaissance art.