Roman Museum Vienna
The Römermuseum Wien is a branch of the Wien Museum . It was opened in May 2008 and is located diagonally across from the Ankeruhr on the Hohen Markt in Vienna . The museum specializes in the history of Vienna in Roman times .
Roman ruins at the Hoher Markt
During canal construction work in 1948, the remains of the tribune houses of the Vindobona legionary camp were discovered on the Hoher Markt . For a long time, the branch of the Wien Museum, formerly known as the Roman ruins on Hohen Markt , was difficult to access for visitors. A narrow staircase led down to the ruins, which were in the basement of the building, while the upper rooms were rented to different restaurants.
The Roman ruins were visited by around 15,000 visitors each year, around half of whom were school classes, for whom the visit was part of their lessons.
The narrowness, the lack of sanitary facilities and the relatively high number of visitors made an expansion urgently necessary.
Expansion to the Roman Museum
When the rooms above the ruins became vacant in spring 2007, the Wien Museum took over the building and began planning a contemporary museum concept for a new museum. It should appeal not only to school classes, but also families and tourists. The project was implemented within 14 months. The construction costs amounted to approx. € 780,000.
The building, built in 1956, had a narrow, elongated floor plan and, with its small-scale room units and a large staircase, did not meet the requirements of modern exhibition areas. Therefore, the architectural office querkraft was commissioned to redesign the building. The renovation took four months.
The original staircase was torn down and the stairs from the basement to the first floor were led along a longitudinal wall, so that the wall uses about 8 meters at its highest point. The staircase was included in the museum presentation. Showcases were embedded in the railing of the stairs, and the wall surface became a concept wall with texts and painted reconstructions.
The glazed outer facade was clad again. Different sized, silver metal fields in the form of building blocks were attached. Some windows are intended to invite people to peer in, and key questions printed on them are intended to arouse the curiosity of passers-by.
In the first year after the museum opened, the number of visitors doubled to more than 30,000.
Museum concept
Almost 105 years before today's Roman Museum Vienna, on May 27, 1903, the first Vienna Roman Museum, the Museum Vindobonense, was opened, but was destroyed by a bombing in 1945.
Research in recent years in particular has expanded our knowledge of the Roman Vindobona and its surroundings. The expansion of the “Roman Ruins Hoher Markt” branch into a Roman museum made it possible to present not only the history of the excavations, but also the history of Vienna in Roman times. The focus is no longer solely on the Roman legionary camp, which once stretched between the Danube Canal and the Graben and whose direct reference can still be seen in the basement with the remains of the tribune houses, but also on the suburb of the camp and the civil town, which is now the 3rd District lay. This is how both military life and civil life are represented.
Due to the limited space, the main focus of the Roman Museum is on the 2nd and 3rd centuries, the heyday of Vindobona.
The tour begins on the ground floor with a brief look back at the time of the Vienna Basin before Roman settlement. Archaeological finds show a Celtic and, from around 50 AD, also Germanic settlement. The fact that the Roman military penetrated the Vienna area even before the legionary camp was established at the end of the 1st century is shown by the tombstone of the legionnaire Caius Atius , which is dated between 6 and 41 AD.
The legionary camp, which existed from the end of the 1st century to the beginning of the 5th century, is represented on the basis of building remains, small finds and reconstructions. Remnants of the wooden palisades have been preserved, as have wall blocks and relief panels from a camp gate. Exhibited semi-finished products are evidence of workshops. Remains of wall paintings from the Legate's Palace are also shown.
Another focus of the museum is on the everyday life of soldiers. The topic of water supply and disposal is presented on the ground floor.
On the first floor, civil life is the main theme. Finds of traditional costumes, inscriptions and ceramics from distant countries that did not come to Vienna through trade give an impression of a multicultural population.
Life in the suburbs and civil cities is also discussed. Thermal baths, temples, theaters and the forum are localized by the small finds shown.
Religion, handicrafts, nutrition, trade, streets and paths, living, work, leisure as well as childhood and death are further topics that are dealt with on the upper floor. The various small finds assigned to the topics are in the showcases, while illustrations of the camp suburb, the civil town and a street of graves support the imagination of the visitors on the walls.
In the basement are the ruins of the tribune houses. These are related to the topic of excavation . A sequence of layers is shown on the wall of the staircase in front of the passage to the ruins, as can be found in excavations in Vienna's city center. The remains of the two tribune houses show construction phases from all phases of the legionary camp. In order to present the excavation site, minor additions and restorations were made, and some walls had to be removed. Its original course was marked in white on the floor.
On the first floor there is a small separate area for changing presentations. Current research results and excavations by various institutions related to the history of Vindobona are shown here.
Since children are the main group of visitors to the Roman Museum, various hands-on objects have been integrated into the exhibition. The replica of a hand mill invites you to try out how much effort a Roman soldier had to put up to grind the grain ration allotted to him in flour. The replica of a Mars statuette can be touched as well as the replica of a tombstone. And the shards of a jug and a mortar want to be put back together again into whole vessels. Various PC stations enable further research and a play station with Roman legionaries and a section of a camp invites you to see Roman Vienna from a slightly different angle.
Awards
In 2009 the Roman Museum Vienna received the Austrian Museum Prize , awarded by the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Art and Culture .
literature
- Michaela Kronberger: A Roman Museum for Vienna. Forum Archaeologiae 47 / VI / 2008.
Web links
Remarks
- ^ Kronberger 2008.
- ^ Kronberger 2008.
- ↑ Wolfgang Kos , foreword, in: Michaela Kronberger (Ed.): Vindobona. Roman Vienna. Vienna 2009.
- ↑ Michaela Kronberger (Ed.): Vindobona. Roman Vienna. Vienna 2009.
- ^ Winners list of the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Art and Culture.
Coordinates: 48 ° 12 ′ 38.6 ″ N , 16 ° 22 ′ 22.2 ″ E