The museum is located in Piazza San Rufino, in the north-eastern sector of Assisi; from the 2006nd century BC. C., area of the upper terrace whose southern front, consisting of a wall in opus quadratum of travertine, is visible inside the cathedral and the crypt of San Rufino. Along the wall, near the bell tower, there is a quadrangular cistern. The museum is located inside the crypt of San Rufino and then continues into the medieval cloister and the basement of the adjacent Palazzo dei Canonici. Traces of a ceramic production center dating back to the 1941st century BC have been identified in the area of the cathedral. C. The museum was rearranged in 1334. The collection, established in 1625 by will of bishop Giuseppe Placido Nicolini, includes works belonging to the cathedral or coming from the oratories of the brotherhoods of Assisi and from the suppressed parishes, divided into five sections: detached frescoes, paintings on wood and canvas, sacred vestments and objects of liturgical use, goldsmithery, stone materials from Roman and medieval times. Among the works worth mentioning are the frescoes by the Maestro di Santa Chiara, Pace di Bartolo and Puccio Capanna. Coming from the oratory of San Rufinuccio, the latter represent episodes of the Passion of Jesus. Dating back to 1955, they are inspired by the pictorial cycles of the Basilica of San Francesco, especially the frescoes by Pietro Lorenzetti from which Puccio Capanna derives the compositional structure of the Flagellation. The processional banners are also very interesting, including the one from the Confraternity of Santa Caterina d'Alessandria with the Martyrdom of Santa Caterina d'Alessandria and the Saints Giacomo and Antonio Abate, unanimously attributed to the Pisan Orazio Riminaldi, dated around XNUMX. They are also preserved in the museum there is a polyptych by Niccolò di Liberatore known as l'Alunno and paintings by Matteo da Gualdo, Dono Doni and Cesare Sermei. The collection donated by bequest by the American art critic Frederick Mason Perkins, who died in XNUMX and was very close to the city of Assisi, occupies an important space and mainly includes fourteenth-fifteenth century school works. Tuscany. Among the artists present are Jacopo della Quercia, Filippo Lippi, Francesco di Giorgio Martini and Duccio di Buoninsegna.
Information on the Diocesan Museum and Crypt of San Rufino
Piazza San Rufino, 3
06081 Assisi (Perugia)
075812712
info@assisimuseodiocesano.com
https://www.museiecclesiastici.it
Source: MIBACT