The study of several thousand fragments of painted plaster found in the cella of the so-called _Auguratorium_, on the south-western slopes of the Palatine, was the subject of a doctoral thesis in Classical Archaeology recently concluded at the University of “La Sapienza” Rome. The fragments, thrown into the cella following Rosa’s excavations in the 1800s, and not related to the brick built tempietto, came from the surrounding buildings (including the House of Livia), many of which are unfortunately unidentifiable. On the basis of technical and stylistic characteristics a substantial number of the fragments – circa 400 – can be ascribed to a fake coffered ceiling, comprising a framework of quadrangular coffers delimited by polychrome bands, decorated internally with sequences of floral and geometric motifs. The presence of a motif of concentric circles on a white background suggests that at the centre of the ceiling was a medallion, perhaps with a painting that is lost. The central element, the choices of colour and style, as well as the close similarity with ceiling such as that in the tomb of Montefiore, date the composition to around the end of the 1st century B.C., at the moment of the passage from the II to III pictorial style.