The ruins of a Roman temple and road surprise guests in the basement of the Hotel Derlon in Maastricht.

Every traveler has war stories about staying in an old ruin of a hotel. But few have bunked down in a modern hotel with real ruins in the basement.

The Golden Tulip Hotel Derlon in Maastricht, the Netherlands' oldest city, stumbled upon its 2,000-year-old treasure trove during construction of a new building in 1983. The hotel, then 140 years old, was past repair; as workers leveled the site and began to dig, they hit large, carved stones just three feet down. The city archaeologist confirmed everyone's suspicion -- this was Roman workmanship.

''We all know this was a Roman town, so finding something archaeological was a possibility,'' general manager Louis Sohl said. ''We never had a cellar here, just a garden -- now we know the cellar was an old Roman temple.''

Many countries ruled

The excavated ruins are a tangible vestige of Maastricht's history, a city that has been under Austrian, Spanish, German, French and ultimately Dutch rule. But before that, there were Celts and Romans.

The floor of the Derlon's cellar museum is now at the street level of 350 A.D., part of a thriving Roman outpost along the Roman road from France to the Rhine. Below, older and deeper, is a Celtic cobblestone road from the first century B.C. This literal crossroads, on the western bank of the River Maas, is the oldest settlement of Maastricht.

As was their wont, the Romans built a temple along the road, erecting a 30-foot statute of Jupiter on a central pillar. A small shop sold votives and holy water from the well.

Today, foundations of the buildings, stone fragments and salvaged artifacts are on display at Hotel Derlon. The bronze head of an unidentified god rests with fragments of tools, clay plates and coins from 265 to 270 A.D. Jupiter's majestic head is safeguarded in the city's Bonnefanten Museum.

Ruins recycled

Some sort of cataclysm destroyed the temple about 270 A.D. The locals returned to the site about 50 years later, leveling the ruins as best they could and recycling the stone into a Roman fort, the Castellum, by 333 A.D. Scientists can date the complex of walls, towers and gates from the wooden pilings under the stone, blocks of which remain in the Derlon cellar.

The dig yielded other treasures, such as a crumpled boot, a bit of bracelet and a bead necklace, showcased in the hotel. The lobby mural immortalizes the busy Roman builders -- archaeologists speculate that their work was finally covered over in the ninth or 10th century, to lie hidden for a millennium until the Hotel Derlon went in search of a cellar.

The Golden Tulip Hotel Derlon, OnzeLieve Vrouweplein 6; a double room is about $200 per night. The excavations are open to hotel guests and free to the public noon-4 p.m. Sundays. For more information, call the Netherlands Board of Tourism, (312) 819-0300.

-- Betsa Marsh

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