Museo Archeologico Provinciale di Salerno

The Museum was established in 1927 and housed, since 1964, in the historic complex of St. Benedict. It houses a rich documentation of the province of Salerno from Prehistory to late antiquity. The route starts from Lapidary occupying open spaces in front of the entrance to the museum and the viridarium, where an exhibition of statues, reliefs and figured honorary bases, for the most part from Salerno and Rome have come to light since the seventeenth century; continues in the lower level, with an exhibition about chronology and topography of the territory of Salerno, integrated with new sites and artifacts recovered from the excavations in the stores and donations since 1928. The prehistoric section includes materials from the Paleolithic and Neolithic, from the caves of Polla, Pertosa, Palinuro, Molpa and Caprioli; and from the Eneolithic, also, coming from Fratte, the oldest settlement in the town of Salerno. The Villanovan Iron Age is documented by artifacts (IX-VIII century BC), from Pontecagnano and Sala Consilina. The burial culture, like that from Oliveto, in Salerno-Cairano, is represented by graves from the eighth to the sixth centuries BC, while the so-called "Orientalizing", characterized by pottery with geometric decoration, was evidenced by findings of Arenòsola, mouth of River Sele. The greek period is documented by the culture and trade from the magnogreci centers between Tyrrhenian and Ionian Seas. To enrich the costumes of men and women from various sites of Salerno is a collection of necklaces and other jewelry in amber, accompanied by ivory and glass paste, with vague or complied with female heads of Silenus, from fifth and fourth century BC, such as the numerous Samnite belts and the beautiful bronze helmets of various ages. The upper floor accommodates the materials coming from the city of Salerno, ideally referring back to the section of Lapidary from take-off in the sixth century BC, in Old Fratte, a suburb NE of Salerno, to the V-VI AD. The last period of the Roman Salernum, founded as a colony in 194 BC, exposes funerals from the marine band: lamps, vases and headstones over a period extending to the fourth century AD, and a beautiful bronze head of Apollo, found in the waters of the Gulf of Salerno in 1930, symbol of the Museums. Complete the exhibition a rich numismatic collection.