Museo Archeologico Nazionale Gaio Cilnio Mecenate ["Gaio Cilnio Mecenate" National Archaeological Museum]
Hosted in the former monastery of San Bernardo, built around the mid 14th century on the remains of a Roman amphitheatre by the Benedictine Olivetan order, and restructured in the 17th and 18th centuries, the Archaeological Museum of Arezzo houses a vast collection of ancient artefacts, mainly from the Etruscan and Roman epochs. It contains a large number of very famous pieces, such as the splendid Attic krater by Euphronios and, from the scientific viewpoint, is especially important for the rooms devoted to the production of Arezzo terra sigillata. This very fine dining-table ceramic, has decorations in relief and is coated with a coral red paint. Produced in series with dies, it was popular from the mid 1st century B.C. to the middle of the following century. The exhibition illustrates its production techniques, and rooms VI, VII and VIII present pieces from the main workshops, of which we can cite those of M. Perennius and C. Ateius.
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Texts by Elena Fani
English translation by Victor Beard
Last update 24/gen/2008