Museum of Rome - Italy

Vacation to Rome Italy and find best accommodation

Palazzo Braschi (Museum of Rome) is a large Neoclassical palace in Rome, Italy and is located between the Piazza Navona, the Campo de' Fiori, the Corso Vittorio Emanuele II and the Piazza di Pasquino. It presently houses the Museo di Roma, the civic museum of Rome.

It was built by the papal nephew Duke Luigi Braschi Onesti, to designs by Cosimo Morelli. The site was purchased in 1790 by Braschi, supported by funds from Pope Pius VI; Braschi demolished the 16th-century palace that Giuliano da Sangallo the Younger had built for Francesco Orsini in order to erect his own from the ground up. Construction was suspended in February 1798 during the Napoleonic occupation of the city, when the French temporarily took possession of it until 1802 and confiscated the recently-acquired collection of antiquities it contained (though Braschi was reimbursed for them). In 1809, when Rome was declared an Imperial city by Napoleon, Duke Luigi moved into the palace and was declared mayor.

On his death in 1816 the palace remained unfinished and the family funds depleted. In 1871 the Braschi Onesti heirs sold the building to the Italian State. During the Italian fascist period, it was used as the political headquarters of Benito Mussolini. After the war, it housed 300 refugee families and many of the interior frescoes were seriously damaged by the fires they lit to keep warm. In 1949 the palace passed to the civic authorities and, following extensive conservation in 1952, the present installation of the museum was effected, .

The main entrance is on Via San Pantaleo (between Piazza Navona and Corso Vittorio Emanuele). The oval hall inside the main entrance overlooks Via San Pantaleo, and leads to the monumental staircase with its eighteen red granite columns which came from the gallery built by the Emperor Caligula on the banks of the River Tiber. Decorating the staircase there are ancient sculptures and fine stuccoes by Luigi Acquisti inspired by the myth of Achilles.
The architect Giuseppe Valadier designed the chapel on the piano nobile or first floor.

Lateran Museum - Rome Italy

The Museum was a museum founded by the Popes and housed in the Lateran Palace, adjacent to the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome, Italy. It ceased to exist in 1970.
Pope Gregory XVI (1831-1846) established the Museo Profano Lateranense (or Museo Gregoriano Profano) in 1844 which was made up of statues, bas-relief sculptures and mosaics of the Roman era. It was expanded in 1854 under Pius IX (1846-1878) with the addition of the Museo Pio Cristiano. The collection was assembled by the archaeologists Father Giuseppe Marchi and Giovanni Battista de Rossi.
Marchi collected the sculptured monuments of the early Christian ages, while de Rossi the ancient Christian inscriptions; a third department of the museum consisted of copies of some of the more important catacomb frescoes. Father Marchi was appointed the director of the new institution. In 1910, under the pontificate of Pius X (1903-1914), the Hebrew Lapidary (Lapidario Ebraico) was established. This section contained 137 inscriptions from ancient Hebrew cemeteries in Rome mostly from via Portuense.
The Museo Missionario Etnografico was founded by Pius XI with the documents and relics exhibited in Rome at the Missionary Exposition in 1925, and included historical documents of Missions and relics from the people where these missions took place. The three collections were transferred, under the pontificate of Pope John XXIII (1958-1963), from the Lateran Palace to the Vatican. They were reopened to the public in 1970. Their collections are still called "ex Lateranense" to indicate their former place of display.

The Lateran Palace is now occupied by the Museo Storico Vaticano which illustrates the history of the Papal States. It was moved to the palace in 1987 and inaugurated in 1991.

Capitoline Museums - Rome

Capitoline Museums (Musei Capitolini) are a group of art and archeological museums in Piazza del Campidoglio, on top of the Capitoline Hill in Rome, Italy. The museums are contained in three palazzi surrounding a central trapezoidal piazza in a plan conceived by Michelangelo Buonarroti in 1536 and executed over a period of over 400 years. The history of the museums can be traced to 1471, when Pope Sixtus IV donated a collection of important ancient bronzes to the people of Rome and located them on Capitoline Hill. Since then, the museums' collection has grown to include a large number of ancient Roman statues, inscriptions, and other artifacts; a collection of medieval and Renaissance art; and collections of jewels, coins, and other items. The museums are owned and operated by the municipality of Rome.

The statue of a mounted rider in the centre of the piazza is of Emperor Marcus Aurelius. It is a copy, the original being housed on-site in the Capitoline museum. Many Roman statues were destroyed on the orders of Christian Church authorities in the Middle Ages; this statue was preserved in the erroneous belief that it depicted the Emperor Constantine, who made Christianity the official state religion of the Roman empire.

The Capitoline Museums Rome are composed of three main buildings surrounding the Piazza del Campidoglio and interlinked by an underground gallery beneath the piazza.
The three main buildings of the Capitoline Museums are:
* Palazzo Senatorio, built in the 12th century and modified according to Michelangelo's designs;
* Palazzo dei Conservatori, built in the mid-16th century and redesigned by Michelangelo with the first use of the giant order column design; and
* Palazzo Nuovo, built in the 17th century with an identical exterior design to the Palazzo dei Conservatori, which it faces across the palazzo.

In addition, the 16th century Palazzo Caffarelli-Clementino, located off the piazza adjacent to the Palazzo dei Conservatori, was added to the museum complex in the early 20th century.

Accademia di San Luca - Rome Museum

Accademia di San Luca, was founded in 1593 as an association of artists in Rome, under the directorship of Federico Zuccari, with the purpose of elevating the work of "artists", which included painters, sculptors and architects, above that of mere craftsmen. Other founders included Girolamo Muziano and Pietro Olivieri. The Academy was named after Saint Lukethe evangelist who, legend has it, made a portrait of the Virgin Mary, and thus became the patron saint of painters' guilds. It was based in an urban block by the Roman Forum and although these buildings no longer survive, the Academy church of Santi Luca e Martina, designed by the Baroque architect, Pietro da Cortona does; its main facade overlooks the Forum.

The Accademia Nazionale di San Luca is its modern descendant. From the very beginning, the statutes of the Academy directed that each candidate-academician was to donate a work of his art in perpetual memory and, later, a portrait. Thus the Academy, in its current premises in the sixteenth-century Palazzo Carpegna, located in the Piazza dell'Accademia di San Luca, has accumulated a unique collection of paintings and sculptures, including about 500 portraits, as well as an outstanding collection of drawings.

Vatican Museums

Visit to Museums in Rome
The Vatican Museums (Musei Vaticani), in Viale Vaticano in Rome Italy, inside the Vatican City, are among the greatest museums in the world, since they display works from the immense collection built up by the Roman Catholic Church throughout the centuries.
Pope Julius II founded the museums in the 16th century. The Sistine Chapel and the Stanze della Segnatura decorated by Raphael are on the visitor route through the Vatican Museums.
The Vatican Museums trace their origin to one marble sculpture, purchased 500 years ago. The sculpture of Laocoon, the priest who, according to Greek mythology, tried to convince the people of ancient Troy not to accept the Greeks' "gift" of a hollow horse, was discovered 14 January 1506, in a vineyard near the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. Pope Julius II sent Giuliano da Sangallo and Michelangelo Buonarroti, who were working at the Vatican, to examine the discovery. On their recommendation, the pope immediately purchased the sculpture from the vineyard owner. The pope put the sculpture of Laocoön and his sons in the grips of a sea serpent on public display at the Vatican exactly one month after its discovery.
The Museums celebrated their 500th anniversary in October 2006 by permanently opening the excavations of a Vatican Hill necropolis to the public.

Sculpture museums
The group of museums includes several sculpture museums surrounding the Cortile del Belvedere.
The Collection of Modern Religious Art houses paintings and sculptures from artists like Carlo Carrà and Giorgio de Chirico.
Pinacoteca Art Gallery
The collection was first housed in the Borgia Apartment, until Pope Pius XI ordered construction of a proper building. The designer was Luca Beltrami. The museum has many famous paintings such as Raphael's Transfiguration, Leonardo da Vinci's Saint Jerome, Caravaggio's Deposition from the cross and Perugino's Madonna and Child with Saints.

Rome - Museums

Travel and visit to museums in Rome
Rome contains huge vastities of culture, treasures, art and sculpture, stored in some of Rome's numerous museums. The Vatican Museums are amongst the most famous and important in the world, with over 4.2 million visitors a year, making them the world's 37th most visited tourist destination.

List of Museums In Rome Italy
* Capitoline Museums
* Castel Sant'Angelo
* Centrale Montemartini
* Doria Pamphilj Gallery
* Enrico Fermi Center
* Forum Antiquarium
* Galleria Borghese
* Galleria Colonna
* Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica
* Gallery of the Academy of Saint Luke
* Geological Museum Rome
* Keats-Shelley Memorial House
* Mausoleum of Augustus
* Trajan's Market
* Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II
* Museo dell'Alto Medioevo
* Museo dell'Ara Pacis
* Museo dell'Arte Classica
* Museo d'Arte Contemporanea
* Museo Atelier Canova Tadolini
* Museo dei Bambini
* Museo Barracco di Scultura Antica
* Museo Carlo Bilotti
* Museo Civico di Zoologia
* Museo del Corso
* Museo Ebraico
* Museo della Mura
* Museo Napoleonico
* Museo Nazionale di Palazzo Venezia
* Museo delle Origini
* Museo Pietro Canonica
* Museo del Risorgimento
* Museo di Roma a Palazzo Braschi
* Museo di Roma in Trastevere
* Museo Storico della Liberazione
* Museo del Vicino Oriente
* Museum of Roman Civilization
* National Etruscan Museum
* National Gallery of Modern Art
* National Museum of Oriental Art
* Museo Nazionale Romano - A set of national museums in Rome; four branches across the city
* Baths of Diocletian
* Crypta Balbi
* Palazzo Altemps
* Palazzo Massimo alle Terme
* Pigorini National Museum of Prehistory and Ethnography
* Pontifical Museum of Christian Antiquities
* Porta San Paolo
* Spada Gallery
* Torlonia Museum
* Vatican Museums
* Villa Farnesina
* Villa di Massenzio