The Cour d'Or museum presents many original features, including the museum building itself, the first work of art to be discovered. You don't go into a museum, you go into history. You will discover unique collections, sheltered by buildings "vestiges of authentic buildings", classified as Historic Monuments and witnesses of legendary eras. The collections of Gallo-Roman objects can be seen on the very spot where the Roman baths were located, dating from the 2nd century AD. "These baths were in fact a gigantic collective bathroom whose foundation corresponds to the arrival of Roman culture on our territories", explains Philippe Brunella, Chief Curator of Heritage and Director of the Metz Métropole Museum. These thermal baths were discovered during work, in 1935, to enlarge the museum. They form a masterpiece of Roman engineering, the builder of a 21 km aqueduct, still partly visible on the outskirts of Metz, and leading the water to these thermal baths, "by simple gravity, without a pump, to the highest point of the city of Metz". In this very rich collection of Gallo-Roman objects, it is a must see, "it is one of the Mona Lisa of the museum: the relief of Mithra, unearthed in Sarrebourg in 1895". At the end of the 1970's, other works and a will to enlarge the museum still reveal elements of the thermal baths: "The whole island that hosts the museum was the island that housed the thermal complex". Another century, the XVth, and its attic of Chèvremont receive part of the medieval collections. This attic, built in 1457, is one of the pillars of the history of Metz, Free City from the 12th to the 16th century. Established on five levels, the granary of Chèvremont allowed the conservation of cereals in large quantities and gave the oligarchy that ruled the city the power "to ward off a siege or to regulate the price of bread and manage social peace". Here you will see a group of sculptures from the region, from the 12th to the 16th century. "We arrive at this space after visiting a museum of medieval architecture which provides a reference point for understanding the architectural elements of Metz". Among these are the painted ceilings of medieval houses in Messina, "in an exceptional state of preservation" and giving an idea of the medieval imagination, notably through a fantastic bestiary. Other collections are to be discovered at the Musée de la Cour d'Or, such as the Fine Arts Museum, with its rooms of paintings from the 16th to the 20th century. They reawaken the - somewhat forgotten - history of the École de Metz, dispersed by the German annexation of 1871 and "contributing to the emergence of the École de Nancy". In order to refine this content/container alliance, one enters the Musée de la Cour d'Or by the year 1670 and the door of the former chapel of the Petits-Carmes
2 rue du Haut Poirier 57 000 Metz
+33 (0)3 87 20 13 20
Open every day from 9am to 12.30pm and from 1.45pm to 5pm
Weekly closing on Tuesdays
