Since its foundation by Pope Paul VI in 1973, the Vatican Historical Museum has functioned as an archive and display for a rich collection of objects illustrating the history of the Papal States. The Curator is Dr. Sandro Barbagallo, and the Museum consists of two parts — the Historical Museum and the Carriage Museum. While the Carriage Museum remains in Vatican City, below the Square Garden of the Vatican Museums, the main Historical collection occupies a satellite location at the Lateran Apostolic Palace, adjacent to the Basilica of St. John in Laterano in the city of Rome. These divisions of the Vatican Historical Museum were inaugurated in 1991.

The Historical Museum houses a variety of artifacts, including a series of papal portraits from the sixteenth century to the present, testimonials of the Pontifical Military Corps, records of the papal chapel and household, as well as relics of papal ceremony no longer in use.

Perhaps the highlight of its collection, however, is the building itself, a palace built by architect Domenico Fontana to replace the existing papal residence during the infamous pontificate of Sixtus V (1585-1590). The walls of the four large halls and eight rooms that make up this Papal Apartment at the Lateran Apostolic Palace are covered in late Mannerist frescoes, which appropriately depict the History of Rome and its popes. These rooms are also decorated with rich tapestries of various periods and schools (some Gobelins of French making, others from the Barberini and San Michele workshops in Rome), wooden sculptures from the thirteenth to eighteenth centuries, historical paintings, and other papal memorabilia, including liturgical vestments of the Borghese-Hercolani Collection. The second wing, the Carriage Museum, is an annex wing on the ground floor of the Vatican Museums that houses and displays the Vatican’s historic collection of papamobili— decorated carriages, saddles, sedans, wagons, and even the first cars used by the Popes.