MUSEO ARCHEOLOGICO NAZIONALE DI NAPOLI

Certainly one of the most impressive archaeological museums in the world. The 16th century building housing the museum first housed the cavalry troops and then the university in the 17th century. From the end of the 18th century (1777), Ferdinand IV decided to transfer there the Farnese collection and the treasures of Pompeii, Herculaneum and Stabies, discovered during archaeological excavations. Later, the museum was enriched with the introduction of private collections (Egyptian and numismatic repertories) and archaeological finds from successive excavations in Campania (Phlegrean Fields, Sorrento...). The richness and quality of its collections are therefore immense. It should be noted that the museum is sorely lacking in means, and therefore in personnel, that the rooms are partially closed on a rotating basis. Please inquire beforehand about the day's closures.

Ground floor: at the entrance, colossal bronze horse's head made by Donatello in Florence in the 15th century and offered by Lorenzo the Magnificent to Count Diomede Carafa. The latter had it installed in the cortile of his palace in via San Biagio dei Librai, where it is replaced today by a terracotta copy. The right wing of the ground floor of the museum houses the sculptures of the Farnese Collection, a collection of works of art built up from the Renaissance by Pope Paul III Farnese and members of his family. It is one of the largest collections of antique sculptures in the world. The FarneseHercules and the Farnese Bull, discovered in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome in the 16th century, can be admired here. These are copies from the Imperial Roman period (2nd-3rd centuries AD) of lost originals from the Hellenistic period (4th century BC). TheFarnese Hercules is the hero at rest, leaning on his club and lion skin after completing his twelve labours. The work is a copy of a bronze original by the Greek Lysippus, the official sculptor of Alexander the Great. Napoleon was very fond of it and tried three times to repatriate it to France, without success! As for the Farnese Bull, it is a masterful statuary group, one of the most monumental that classical antiquity has bequeathed to us (more than 5 m high!), sculpted in a single block of marble. It depicts a tragic episode from mythology: the punishment of Dirce, tied to the tail of a furious bull by the sons of Antiope because she had mistreated their mother. Also to be seen: the Tyrannoctones, the Oriental-inspiredArtemis of Ephesus, theAphrodite Callipyge (a term of Greek origin which means "with a beautiful buttocks"!), the Doryphorus, a marble copy of the work of the Athenian Polyclæte, the most accomplished example of classical Greek sculpture. Some rooms house the Farnese jewels, such as the Farnese Cup made in a single piece of agate by craftsmen in Alexandria in the 2nd century BC.

Basement: it houses the Egyptian section and the epigraphic section, with inscriptions in the various languages that were spoken in the peninsula during Antiquity: Latin, Greek, Osque, Etruscan, etc

First floor: a group of prestigious mosaics, mostly from the Roman villas of Pompeii and Herculaneum, is on display. The most famous is The Battle of Alexander: unearthed in the House of Fauna in Pompeii, its reproduction adorns the cover of the textbooks of all Latinist students! It represents the victory of Alexander the Great against the Persian Darius. Also still lifes, scenes of theatrical inspiration or daily life. Do not miss the visit of the Secret Cabinet, a collection of erotic works (sculptures, paintings, mosaics) found during the excavations of the sites buried under the ashes of Vesuvius.

Second floor: it houses various sections including a rich collection of frescoes by Pompeii, Herculaneum and Stabies, inspired by mythology, tragedy and nature (observe the delicacy of the colours and the successful perspective of the painted architectural frames). Some rooms present the archaeological repertoire from the Temple of Isis in Pompeii, including frescoes depicting Nilotic scenes (set in landscapes reminiscent of the banks of the Nile). The vast Meridian Hall takes its name from the southern line that runs diagonally across its pavement, which was laid out in 1791. Further on, a model of Pompeii shows the extension of the archaeological site. The other collections are dedicated to glassware, silverware (a silver service from the Menander's House in Pompeii), small bronzes, prehistory and protohistory of Campania. Finally, a section is dedicated to the Villa des Papyrus, an aristocratic villa in Herculaneum from which a rich collection of marble and bronze sculptures originate. In the library of the villa, excavated in the 18th century, 1,800 papyrus scrolls with Greek and Latin texts were found, some of which would not have come down to us otherwise. This is the case of Epicure's Sulla Natura, of which we have no other copy. The papyri are kept at the Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III in Naples, but the museum displays two copies of the machine invented to unroll the papyri, which were in an extremely fragile state