It bears witness to the pivotal period between the Vandal kingdom and the Byzantine reconquest of present-day Tunisia.

During excavations in the 1950s, it was decided to move it to the Baths of Antoninus archaeological park, given its state of preservation, so that the mosaic decoration would not be lost as a result of urban development in the area.

The Asterius chapel is located within the archaeological park of Baths of Antoninus, but comes from an excavation in the Lyceum district of Carthage, northeast of the city,[F 1] on the hill of .

[G 2] The area in which the chapel was found is located on the outskirts of the ancient city, like many Christian buildings.

[G 3] Several tombs were excavated, including a painted and stuccoed vault and another with a marble sarcophagus containing a lead coffin.

[G 5] The space was later refurbished with a more sumptuous décor, featuring floor mosaics and stucco or paintings on the walls, and sometimes marble.

[G 7] The baptistery, fed by a well, is "the most remarkable part of the complex":[G 7] four-lobed in shape, with access via steps on the north-west side.

The baptistery area featured painted figures with halos, one of whom has been identified as Saturus, one of Perpetua and Felicity's companions.

[E 2] During excavations, archaeologists found three Maurice Tiberius coins[C 2] under the mosaic,[F 4][H 1] dating from the building's second state.

[G 2] According to Noël Duval, the baptistery and underground installation may be linked to an occupation during the Vandal period, when the Arians took control of the buildings.

[G 2] The chapel was discovered in December 1950,[G 4] along with other Palaeochristian burials, during work to build a villa on a housing estate between the Carthage Lyceum and the Fontaine aux mille amphores (Fountain of a Thousand Amphorae).

One of the tombs has a stuccoed decoration that has almost disappeared, another has a marble sarcophagus containing a lead coffin,[F 3] and two underground funerary chapels with a similar layout have been found.

[G 11] The chapel of Asterius, the best preserved[F 3] but condemned to destruction for the construction of the Lyceum, was relocated; the decorative elements were more precisely replaced in a building of similar plan erected in the archaeological park of Antonin's baths.

[G 4] The building was reconstructed in the park in early 1951 by the architectural department of the Tunisian Antiquities and Arts Authority, under the direction of Alexandre Lézine.

[H 1] The burial chamber is 2 m high and trapezoidal in shape, measuring 2.92 m-3.96 m by 2.42 m-2.46 m.[H 1] The chapel was carved out of tuff rock, with masonry additions and a rubble stone vault.

[F 4] The loculus that housed the reliquary was found empty, and the columns supporting the altar measure around 15 cm in diameter.

[C 2] The apse, which has approximately the same orientation as the decumani of the ancient city grid,[E 6] is about 0.17 m higher than the nave and the ceiling is a maximum of 1.73 m high.

[H 1] The chapel was carefully decorated, with murals and mosaics featuring birds in medallions in rather poor colors[F 4] and rhombus shapes.

[E 10] Fragments of the geometric mosaic were found during excavations,[E 11] and may correspond to the first state of the painted decoration on the walls.

[E 1] The current mosaic may not be "contemporary with the construction of the building";[E 1] the most recent mosaic is dated by the coins of Emperor Maurice: the late dating can be confirmed by the shape of the tesserae, the materials and the colors, comparable to Byzantine elements identified in Antonin's baths.

[C 1] The vestibule contains a fishy sea mosaic[G 4] on a white background[H 1] depicting, among other things, "a dolphin, a mullet, a shell, a torpedo and the remains of a jellyfish",[E 8] while the main room contains bird and geometric motifs.

[E 9] The apse featured a white-background mosaic with a medallion containing a Maltese cross, around which were slots for colonnettes intended to support an altar table, two of which were uncovered during archaeological investigations.

[E 6] Various architectural elements were found during excavations: a pillar cap, a corbel, fragments of an architrave, two white marble columns, one of which was present in situ in the apse.

[E 15] Fragments of epitaphs have been found in reuse in the apse steps: vixit annis sex, d(e)p(ositus) V kal(endas) octob(res).

[E 20] A study of the chapel has revealed the existence of an altar in the apse, a feature already present in certain buildings in the Balkans, Pécs and Salona, which are however martyria where no cult is held for the deceased.