Want To See Museums In Your Tour Of Rome? Here Are 8 Musts!
August 19th, 2009 by Cristiano Rubbi, under Travel and Leisure. No Comments
Museo Nazionale Romano – Crypta Balbi (Roman National Museum – Crypta Balbi). Opened only a few years ago, this museum is particularly impressive because it provides a reconstruction of the general background as well as the daily life of the ancient Romans. It is divided in three sections and each contributes to the general picture with archaeological findings of all kinds and with plastic models of dwellings and other structures. The whole exhibition covers a span of time down to the Middle Ages.
Musei Capitolini (Capitoline Museums). Museums are often especially made to house ancient works of art, but when they are centuries old themselves there is obviously additional charm for visitors to relish. This is the case with the Capitoline Museums, located on top of the Capitoline Hill in Rome. The art collections of ancient statues, jewels, coins and Roman remains are as impressive as the unique view of the city that you can enjoy from the Capitoline Hill, which is literally in the centre of Rome.
Galleria Borghese (Borghese Gallery). The Borghese family was – and still is – one of Rome’s most prominent families. A member of the Family, that owned a huge park in Rome, had a palace built in the grounds of the park. This palace in time became what is now the Galleria Borghese, or Borghese Gallery. An elegant building in itself, the Galleria, however, is known for an excellent collection of ancient sculptures and of statues sculpted by Bernini (Apollo and Daphne) and Canova (Venus Victrix). The first floor houses numerous paintings by famous artists such as Caravaggio, Botticelli, Raphael, Titian and Rubens. Among their works we might mention Raphael’s Entombment of Christ, Caravaggio’s Boy with a Basket of Fruit and Titian’s Sacred and Profane Love.
Museo della Civilta Romana (Museum of the Roman Civilization). This museum illustrates the history of Roman Civilization from its origins up to 4th century A.D. Essentially, the museum is structured as follows: the historical sections, the sections by themes and a model of Imperial Rome. The historical sections provide illustrations of various significant stages in Roman history, while single themes are dealt with in individual rooms. The model of Imperial Rome in the age of Constantine I actually takes two rooms. This museum houses inter alia a model Archaic Rome, some artefacts of Imperial and early Christian art and a sequence of horizontal casts of the reliefs on Trajan’s Column.
Mercati di Traiano (Trajan’s Markets). The site offers an excellent opportunity to see how an urban area can over time be developed in completely different ways. This particular place was, at various times, a market, an office area, a residential suburb, a fortification, a religious building and military lodgings. Efforts have been made to illustrate as well as possible the different stages in the use of the area. In particular, archaeologists and researches have endeavoured to render everything clearly understandable to modern visitors.
Museo di Roma in Trastevere (Museum of Rome in Trastevere). Opened just over 30 years ago, this museum is located in an old Roman suburb named Trastevere. This is no coincidence. A special effort was made to place the museum in an area that was in harmony with the subject covered by the permanent exhibition. The museum is intended to illustrate the life of ordinary people during the second part of the 18th century and the 19th century. The exhibits displayed, which include a number of paintings and prints, offer an unbelievably different picture of Rome from what you can see these days. One room houses a crib set in 18th century Trastevere and the figures dressed in period costume.
Museo di Roma (Museum of Rome). Like most major cities, Rome is a growing city and changes take place almost imperceptibly every day. Since the early 20th century marked a turning point in the city’s evolution, it was felt that an appropriate museum should be built in order to collect as many items as possible to describe the changes that the city had undergone since the Middle Ages. The vast collection of ceramics, paintings, photographs, costumes and art-pieces successfully describes the continued transformation of Rome through the ages, both from a social point of view as well as from an architectural standpoint.
Museo Barracco (Barracco Museum). This museum was set up to exhibit a collection of ancient sculptures donated by a Calabrian nobleman to the city of Rome in 1904. This incredibly varied collection includes statues coming from the Middle East (Assyrian and Phoenician), in addition to Egyptian, Greek, Etruscan and Roman masterpieces. The building housing the museum is a very elegant building dating from the Renaissance, considered an excellent example of that particular style.
