Museum of Rural Civilization of Ruffano

The Museum of Peasant Civilization, founded in 2002, is housed on the ground floor of the eighteenth-century Palazzo Pasanisi of Torrepaduli to create a cultural center in the town for both locals and tourists. The museum consists of 10 rooms: in some rooms the original use has been preserved, others have been renovated for laboratory purposes. The museum offers the visitor the opportunity for an interesting journey inside the Salento peasant civilization from the late 1800s to a few decades ago. 

The museum not only serves to preserve objects, tools, toys… but it is also the venue for cultural events and performances, hosting every year a characteristic living nativity scene sponsored by the municipality, the province, and the region, now successfully reached its seventh edition. The museum, besides being a place for the enhancement and protection of the ethno-anthropological cultural heritage, carries out an educational role through targeted laboratory activities aimed at understanding the various aspects of peasant civilization.