The Museum is located inside the main university building, overlooking the Courtyard of the Fallen, the ancient medical courtyard of the University.
Inaugurated in 1936, it preserves manuscripts, printed texts, scientific instruments, anatomical and naturalistic preparations that bear witness to the history of the University from its medieval origins.
The original cores of the main collections date back to the second half of the 18th century – when, following the reforms enacted by the Empress of Austria Maria Theresa, the University of Pavia became one of the most advanced scientific centers in Europe – including the physics section, gathered around the instruments from Alessandro Volta’s old laboratory, and the medicine section, inheriting the anatomical collections that Antonio Scarpa had organized precisely in the rooms that currently house the Museum.
In the medicine section, organized into three rooms, instruments and preparations related to the work of Antonio Scarpa’s anatomical school and Lazzaro Spallanzani’s natural history museum are kept; both arrived in Pavia at the end of the 18th century. It also features the progress in surgery and clinical studies through the 19th and 20th centuries, with figures such as Luigi Porta and Carlo Forlanini, and the activities of the scientific school founded by Camillo Golgi, the first Italian to win – in 1906 – the Nobel Prize in Medicine for developing a histological method that laid the groundwork for modern neuroscience.
In the physics section, the Physics Cabinet of Alessandro Volta has been reconstructed; it was originally on the first floor, overlooking the legal portico, in rooms adjacent to the Physical Theater.
Under Volta’s direction, starting from 1778, the Cabinet was equipped with the newest instruments for teaching and research and became a place admired by many Italian and foreign visitors. A second room houses instruments used by Volta’s successors during the 19th century.
The Museum also preserves an archive covering a chronological span from the early 15th to the 20th century. The documentation, particularly interesting regarding the history of medicine, is an important complement to what is kept at the State Archives of Pavia (the university’s old archive) and the Historical Archive of the University.
Information about the Museum for the History of the University of Pavia
Strada Nuova, 65
27100 Pavia (Pavia)
0382 984707
mariacarla.garbarino@unipv.it
https://musei.unipv.it/msu/
Source: MIBACT
