Museo Archeologico Regionale Paolo Orsi
The Museo Archeologico Regionale Paolo Orsi in Syracuse is one of the most extensive archaeological museums in Europe. The collection contains 18,000 exhibits from the eastern part of Sicily from the prehistory and early history of the island to the early Christian period.
history
As early as 1811, the archaeologist Saverio Landolina, with the support of the Syracuse bishop Filippo Maria Trigona , initiated the first museum in the seminary of the archbishop's palace on the Piazza Duomo, which expanded an older collection that had existed there since 1780. After the discovery of the sarcophagus of Adelphia in the catacombs of San Giovanni in 1872, interest in a larger, publicly funded museum grew . The discussions finally led to the establishment of the Regio Museo Archeologico Nazionale (German Royal National Museum of Archeology) in 1876 , which was opened in 1886 in the converted building of the former church of San Giovanni di Dio, also located on Cathedral Square. The archaeologist Paolo Orsi had been working at the museum as an inspector since 1888, before taking over its management as director from 1895 to 1934 and shaping the museum into an internationally important and scientifically oriented institution.
In 1942, Paolo Orsini was succeeded by Luigi Bernabò Brea as director of the museum, which, after its reopening after the end of the war , increasingly suffered from a lack of space in the following years: departments such as the laboratories and the depot had to be relocated to other buildings, the increase in stocks and Bernabò Breas' new conception of a systematic and comparative collection presentation as well as the reorientation as a public museum required additional space. Considerations for expanding the museum on the Piazza Duomo, for example in the Palazzo Beneventano del Bosco , were therefore abandoned in favor of a new building that could better meet the requirements. In 1967 the architect Franco Minissi was commissioned to plan a new building in the park of Villa Landolina near the Parco Archeologico della Neapolis . In 1988 the new museum could finally be opened at its current location. It was named in honor of Paolo Orsis.
The museum building
When planning the new museum, great importance was attached to the flexibility of the new building, which on the one hand meets the expectations of the visitors for a concentrated exhibition based on outstanding exhibits, but on the other hand also has space in the departments for comparative presentations of numerous objects in the sense of a study collection should offer. In addition, it should be able to react flexibly to the future development of the holdings, archaeological research and the forms of museum presentation.
The architect Franco Minissi developed the new museum with a total area of 12,000 m² on three floors (including the basement) around an auditorium. It forms the didactic center around which the various departments are grouped. For the collection rooms, Minissi chose a free floor plan with no fixed room boundaries on the basis of a strict grid of equilateral triangles, which allows the required flexibility in the design of the exhibition. The grid can be read in many ways in the building: the overall floor plan is inscribed in a triangle, in the interior the grid is directly visible in the construction of the ceilings. It extends into the details of the furnishings, so the display cabinets and platforms for the exhibits are partly composed of triangular elements. The exhibition rooms are partly illuminated by skylights and partly by windows facing the inner courtyards.
The auditorium is a round, free-standing hall in the center of the facility, in which lectures and video shows take place. The hall around the hall leads to the various departments of the museum, which are called sectors here. In the basement there are laboratories and the museum's depot as well as the coin collection. The total area of the exhibition rooms is 9,000 m².
collection
According to Bernabò Breas' conception, the collection is divided into six chronological areas from prehistory to the Byzantine Empire . Initially, however, only three sectors A to C were implemented on the ground floor, which did not yet exactly map this planned structure. Sector D was opened on the upper floor in 2006, followed in 2014 by the Rotunda of Adelphia, the first part of Sector F.
The coin cabinet , the last part of the collection, was moved from Piazza Duomo to the new location in 2010 and found its new home in a vault in the basement.
Sector A: Prehistory
Here the geology and paleontology of Sicily are illustrated and exhibits from the Paleolithic , Neolithic and Bronze Ages are shown. Particularly noteworthy are a collection of bright red vases from the necropolis of Pantalica and bronze weapons from the necropolis near Caltagirone .
Sector B: Syracuse in archaic and classical times
The department is primarily dedicated to the Greek colonization of Sicily from the 8th century BC. Chr. Many finds are from Syracuse and Megara Hyblaea , further from Naxos , Catana , Leontini and Zancle .
Among the outstanding exhibits are the grave goods from the necropolis of Syracuse, terracotta objects from the Temple of Apollo in Syracuse and two statues. The limestone figure of a mother goddess suckling her twins dates from the 6th century BC. BC and was discovered at Megara Hyblaea.
Sector C: The Colonies of Syracuse
Finds from Agrigento , Gela and the Greek colonies that were founded in Sicily under the rule of Syracuse are exhibited here . Particularly noteworthy is a large collection of ceramic vessels and relief plates from Francavilla di Sicilia , which depict the worship of the fertility goddess Demeter .
Sector D: Hellenism and Roman Empire
The fourth sector D on the upper floor of the museum was added in 2006 and presents works of art from the Hellenistic - Roman period. The central exhibit is the marble statue of Venus Landolina , a Roman copy of a Hellenistic Venus pudica from the first half of the first century BC. It was named after the archaeologist Saverio Landolina , who discovered the figure in 1804 in a small temple in Syracuse.
Sector F: Early Christian and Byzantine times
In the Rotunda of Adelphia , which was inaugurated in 2014, the Adelphia sarcophagus from the fourth century is the most important exhibit of Sector F, which is dedicated to early Christian art. The rotunda addresses the location of the sarcophagus in the catacombs of St. Giovanni in Syracuse.
The construction of Sector F was completed in 2018, it now shows a variety of finds and architectural elements from the hypogea and Christian burial places in the catacombs of Syracuse and the surrounding area.
Web links
- Museo Archeologico Regionale Paolo Orsi on the website of the Region of Sicily (Italian / English)
- Regional Archaeological Museum Paolo Orsi , Siracusa Turismo (Italian / English)
- The Paolo Orsi Regional Archaeological Museum with more information and images, sicilytourist.com
- Virtual museum visit ( Google Street View )
literature
- Alessio Cardaci, Antonella Versaci and Luca Fauzia: Between anti-museum and interactive museum: the case study of “Paolo Orsi” in Syracuse, Italy. Contributions to the XI. International Forum Le Vie dei Mercanti: Heritage, Architecture, Landesign. Aversa / Capri , June 2013, pp. 905-914 ( abstract ).
Individual evidence
- ↑ Siracusa, Il Paolo Orsi arricchisce i propri spazi: sabato inaugurazione del settore intitolato alla Rotonda di Adelfia. Siracus News, May 12, 2014 (Italian, accessed February 18, 2015).
- ^ “Il Cristianesimo a Siracusa e nel territorio”, sabato al via la mostra permanent. Siracus News, April 5, 2018 (Italian, accessed September 15, 2018).
Coordinates: 37 ° 4 ′ 35 ″ N , 15 ° 17 ′ 11 ″ E