The archaeological collection of the Rimini Museum, arranged by Luigi Tassini in 1844, and the art gallery, founded in 1924. Equipped with modern educational and informational services, the museum houses materials from excavations and archaeological findings, demolished buildings, deposits, and donations that document the history of Rimini and its territory. The first core of the civic collections was the lapidary, arranged in 1981 in the inner courtyard of the college through the efforts of Giancarlo Susini and Angela Donati. It consists of 68 inscriptions from the 1st century BC to the 4th century AD.
In addition to important funerary steles and honorary bases, there are architectural fragments and elements of notable building interest, such as the inscription relating to the paving of Rimini’s streets promoted by Gaius Caesar. The archaeological section of the Rimini Museum unfolds beginning from the basement of the Jesuit College, where in about forty rooms the entire history of Rimini is revisited, from the first evidence of Homo erectus found on the Covignano hill, to the foundation of Ariminum in 268 BC by the Romans and the city’s development in the Republican and mid-Imperial ages.
The journey then continues with an in-depth look at the historical evolution of Rimini during the Imperial era, in the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD. To the varied and beautiful series of Roman mosaics, including the famous “boats” mosaic from the domus of Palazzo Diotallevi and the “Anubis” mosaic, are added the very rare multicolored glass paste panel depicting fish and the richest surgical kit of antiquity, both discovered in the nearby Domus of the Surgeon which, recently turned into a museum, constitutes the natural exterior continuation of the museum itinerary.
The path of the Rimini Museum
The museum route unfolds through about seventy rooms spread over three floors. The historical-artistic section of the Rimini Museum, with about five hundred works on display, allows a comprehensive visit through the Rimini artistic journey from the 14th to the 19th century, beginning with the famous 14th-century school represented by Giuliano and Giovanni from Rimini and their pupils. The Malatesta period is recalled by the famous Pietà by Giovanni Bellini (1460) and the equally renowned altarpiece of St. Vincent Ferrer by Ghirlandaio (1494), followed by works by Benedetto and Bartolomeo Coda (such as Benedetto Coda’s altarpiece Madonna with Child and Saints, and Bartolomeo Coda’s The Last Supper), Bagnacavallo, Mastelletta, Salvator Rosa, Guercino, Cagnacci, Maffei, Piazzetta, Marchetti, Pittoni, and Bigari.
A section of the Rimini Museum is dedicated to 19th-century Rimini painter Guglielmo Bilancioni; two rooms are reserved for drawings, paintings, and graphic works by René Gruau, an artist who worked with the greatest tailors including Dior, Chanel, Givenchy, and Balenciaga. Among local history testimonies are also nine tapestries that adorned the municipal halls, woven in Antwerp in the 18th century on cartoons by A. van Diepenberk; the famous “saracen” used in 17th-century jousts and a series of coats of arms (16th-17th centuries) from the most important city palaces along with other stone fragments.
The importance of the city of Ariminum, the earliest of the Roman foundations in Emilia-Romagna, is perfectly emphasized in the archaeological section of the Rimini Museum through a succession of themes that provide a complete presentation of the city, its relations with the motherland Rome, its political-social organization, its thriving economy, and equally flourishing productive activities.
An extraordinary selection of materials from the Rimini Museum documents its forms of craftsmanship, recalls domestic environments with their furnishings, equipment, and precious household items reintroduced through objects from the rich city domus, highlights the relations maintained by the port city with the sea and the trade occurring with the East and Africa, reconstructs forms of public and private worship, presents some major urban architectural evidences like the amphitheater.
Finally, a place of absolute prominence is reserved for reconstructions related to the Domus of the Surgeon, for which the public is shown facsimiles of some rooms: the medical study, the bedroom, the dining room with furniture, flooring, decorations, and furnishings verified during the archaeological excavation. The domus was indeed equipped with precious features such as mosaics, plasters, and colorful and precious wall decorations. As is known, the investigations conducted there also allowed the recovery of the almost complete professional kit of the surgeon, which represents a fundamental material and cultural testimony of medical practice in antiquity. Taken as a whole, the domus constitutes a rare example of a clinical complex combining the doctor’s residence with rooms intended for receiving, visiting, and caring for patients, as well as spaces used for preparing medicines. Source: MIBACT
Information about Rimini City Museum
Via Tonini, 1, 47921
Rimini
Tel.054121482
Email: musei@comune.rimini.it
Hours: Tuesday to Saturday 8:30-13 and 16-19, Sundays and holidays 10-12:30 and 15-19
