Basilica of Sant’Ambrogio

Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio tickets: which one to buy

The church is free to enter; two things inside are ticketed and both are cheap. The treasury and the crypt, where the skeletons of Ambrose and the martyrs Gervasius and Protasius lie dressed in vestments in a glass case, are entered from the right aisle. The Sacello di San Vittore in Ciel d'Oro, a fourth-century chapel with a gold mosaic vault and the earliest surviving portrait of Ambrose, has its own small charge and is the finest thing in the building.

Guided tours of old Milan include Sant'Ambrogio and cost several times the entries; the church is a short walk from the Duomo or one metro stop. Nothing needs booking. The university that surrounds it means the neighbourhood is busy with students and cheap to eat in, which is not true of central Milan generally. The Sacello ticket is sold in the shop by the right aisle and includes a printed sheet explaining the mosaic, which is otherwise unlabelled.

Visiting Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio: what to see

Ambrose, bishop of Milan when the city was an imperial capital, built this church between 379 and 386 over the graves of martyrs, and he is buried in it. The present building is eleventh and twelfth century and is the model for Lombard Romanesque: a broad brick front with two unequal towers, a colonnaded atrium in front, and inside a low ribbed vault over a nave with no windows at the sides, so the light comes from the lantern.

The golden altar of 835, worked in gold, silver and enamel by a craftsman called Vuolvinus, is the most important piece of Carolingian metalwork in Europe. A bronze serpent on a column, said by medieval Milanese to be the one Moses raised in the desert, faces a crucifix across the nave. Outside, one column carries two holes that legend attributes to the devil's horns. In the atrium, Roman and early Christian inscriptions are set into the walls, and a tomb slab records a sixth-century deacon in Latin verse.

Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio opening hours and the best time to go

Open daily with a long break in the middle of the day and a shorter Sunday schedule; the ticketed parts close earlier than the church and are shut on some weekday afternoons. The atrium is open whenever the church is and is worth sitting in. The interior is dim, so the middle of the day gives the best light on the golden altar, which is also lit on a timer for a small coin.

Milan is hot in August and many businesses close, though the church does not. Dress code is applied. Photography without flash is allowed. Allow forty-five minutes with the crypt and the chapel. The Museum of Science and Technology with Leonardo's machines is next door and takes a full afternoon. Students from the Catholic university fill the surrounding bars at lunchtime, which makes the area one of the cheapest places to eat in the centre.