“Antiquarium of Poggio Civitate” is the name of the Archeological Museum of the Etruscan village of Murlo, because there are finds coming from the very important tempering of the Etruscan site of Poggio Civitate. The decision to expose the recovered materials close to the site of discovery, dated in the seventies, leads to the inauguration of the museum in 1988 in the Palazzone; recently, in 2002, the museum has been reordered and expanded with the acquisition of another building and with the addition of new finds. Is part of the Sienese Museum.
The specificity of the Antiquarium of Poggio Civitate derives from the fact that they are exposed almost exclusively relics and objects from buildings patrizi Etruscans to a period between the V and VII century before Christ. The reconstructions that it has been possible to realize with the artifacts found,sculptures and the acroteri, the sime, tools and household objects, ceramics, terracotta and bucchero, in bone and ivory, transmit to us valuable information on the uses and customs, on contacts and trade of refined Etruscan civilization of the epoch.
Many findings of the Museo di Murlo are of the “unicum”: they are universally known to the roof of the house of the prince (to which you have recently added that of the handicraft laboratory), the sime race of horses and that of the banquet, . the acroterio known as the “Cappellone” for the particular shape of the cap, which has become the symbol and the brand of Murlo.
Poggio Civitate
Poggio Civitate is situated in the south-east of Murlo and is part of the hills that separate the alluvial zones of recent formation from the oldest area of the Metalliferous Hills that reaches the sea. The place is wooded and on its top a large plateau of about 700 m x 400, at an altitude of 365 m invites to the settlement. At Poggio Civitate settled in fact the Etruscans. The most ancient, orientalisation, is characterized by the building of Poggio Civitate rich decorations acroteriali.
The building was destroyed by a fire around 600 BC it was rebuilt shortly after. In 525 B.C. the palace was deliberately abandoned and after a voluntary scrapping, around the entire living area, was built an embankment of stone and earth that hinder the access to the site. The Orientalisation palace measured over 35 m in length and a width of 8, without internal dividers but probably in two floors, with the lower part was used as a warehouse as demonstrated by the remains of pithoi buried in the floor.
Most of the exhibits more interesting were found under the layer of collapse due to fire and demonstrate how the inhabitants are worried to escape without having the time to take care how much is left behind. Around 580 B.C. the residence was rebuilt on the ruins of the previous collapse but with great dimensions. It was a quadrilateral 60 m side oriented toward the south-east to the angles of which there were rooms by similar characteristics so as to assume that could even be towers, or anyway they served to ensure stability to the assembly.
The rooms, in number of 18 opened toward an internal courtyard featuring an arcade located on three sides; on the fourth side was a templum where with all probability were guarded the simulacrums of numi tutelari. Outside the resort, in a portion of the ground located in the south west~, you tròvava a building used to yard~laboratory, where various artisans worked ceramics, gold, ivory, bone and bronze. Furnaces were discovered near. The acroterio of the palace was characterized by fittili figures all round depicting characters sitting with headgear with wide stretched and mythological figures fantastic.
The internal courtyard was instead decorated with slabs of terracotta depicting scenes convivial, horse racing, hunting scenes. In the museum in the Palazzone di Murlo costoditi are findings of Poggio Civitate that in their whole give the perception of a glimpse of daily life etrusca instead of what is commonly used to seeing with the finds coming from the necropolis illustrating generally the cult for the dead. The archaeological site, from when it was discovered, is the subject of a campaign of excavations, which cooperates, in recent years, the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Opening Hours
– April through September Tuesday – Sunday 10 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. / 3:30 p.m. / 7 p.m. and all holidays
– October through March Friday – Sunday 10:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m./14:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. and all holidays (except Dec. 25-26 and Jan. 1)
poggiocivitate@museisenesi.org