Photo © Franco Beccari

Museums of Lunigiana: which ones to visit

From prehistory to the twentieth century to read and discover the area

Visiting the museums of Lunigiana, today included in the provincial network "Terre dei Malaspina e delle Statue Stele", means taking a journey into local history, from Prehistory to the twentieth century, to better understand the experience of the territory and its people.

Today, much of the history and cultural tradition of Lunigiana is in fact contained in the many museums scattered throughout the territory, where the memory of the past and the understanding of the present strengthen each other, passing on the incredible cultural heritage.

Contents

1.

Science Museums
2.

Religious Museums
3.

Historical Remembrance Museums

Science Museums

Caves of Equi - Credit: Caves of Equi

Lunigiana Stele Statues Museum (Pontremoli)
The Museum houses a highly evocative collection that tells of one of the most important, and still today one of the most mysterious, phenomena of Lunigiana. Within the evocative setting of the Piagnaro Castle, the iconic Stele Statues have been on display since 1975: anthropomorphic sculptures sculpted in sandstone between 4000 and 600 BC by the populations who lived at that time in the Magra River valley and which, today, constitute the oldest artistic phenomenon of Lunigiana.
Prehistoric Tecchia and Archaeological Museum (Fivizzano)
Visit the Prehistoric Tecchia, a splendid archaeological and paleontological site of international reputation set up with displays containing real finds directly from the excavation area. You can discover this cave where Neanderthals and extinct prehistoric animals lived, such as the Cave Bear. In the Archaeological Museum you can see a reproduction of the Giant Cave Bear, a whole skeleton of an adult bear and other artifacts related to human presence found during excavations in the nearby prehistoric Tecchia.
Museum of Natural History of Lunigiana (Aulla)
Located in the majestic Brunella Fortress, the museum is made up of exhibition rooms that allow us to learn about the close link between human, agricultural and pastoral activity and the natural heritage of Lunigiana.

Religious Museums

Former Augustinian Convent Complex

Museum, Church and Tomb of San Caprasio (Aulla)
Inside the Abbey of San Caprasio, still a fundamental stopping place along the Via Francigena in Lunigiana, there are historical and cultural artifacts that belonged to abbots, monks and pilgrims over the centuries, along with the findings from the archeological excavations in 2003.
Diocesan Museum (Pontremoli)
The museum, inaugurated in 2009, is located under the Bishop's Palace in Piazza Duomo, one of the most important and symbolic squares in the town, and it contains, narrates and enhances the value of the religious and artistic heritage of the diocese of the "noble city", coming from the various churches in Lunigiana.
Former Convent Complex of the Order of Saint Augustine (Fivizzano)
Founded with a seal dated June 27, 1391, it still preserves places and an invaluable heritage: from the Civic Library, with about 30,000 books, to the Edmondo Bernacca Meteo Museum (Weather Museum), the Church of San Giovannii, the Museum of Sacred Art, with works collected in sacred buildings in the area and the cloister of the Convent, decorated with marvelous seventeenth-century frescoes.

Historical Remembrance Museums

Audiovisual Museum of the Resistance - Credit: Museo Audiovisivo della Resistenza

Lunigiana Ethnographic Museum (Villafranca in Lunigiana)
The peasant and pastoral traditions of Lunigiana expertly set up and narrated in the ancient 16th-century mills on the Bagnone Torrent.
Digital Museum of Local Identity (Fivizzano)
Inside the Grotte di Equi Geo-archeo-adventure park, the interactive touchscreen tour will introduce you to the life and work of the inhabitants of the Valley of the Lucido Torrent: from the marble work to the arrival of the railway and from the rural world to the relationship with nature, the caves and the Tecchia di Equi, the Terme di Equi, the events and the social life.
Museum Archive of Remembrance (Bagnone)
Since 2004, it has been preserving and enhancing the value of the artistic, historical and documentary heritage of the Valley of the Bagnone Torrent, narrating the gender relationship in Lunigiana’s social world, through photos and testimonies.
Museum of Emigration of the Tuscan People (Mulazzo)
Set up in the rooms of Lusuolo Castle, it is dedicated to the phenomenon of emigration of the Tuscan population around the world and it tells the stories of those who left in search of fortune and a better life, through photographs, objects and documents.
Malaspina Archive Museum (Mulazzo)
In the palace, and ancient residence, of the Marquises Malaspina of Mulazzo, there is a museum dedicated to the lineage and to the great navigator Alessandro Malaspina, whose objects, books, manuscripts and navigational instruments are preserved there.
Audiovisual Museum of the Resistance (Fosdinovo)
Built in a centuries-old chestnut grove, a place that was the scene of struggles in the period of the Italian Liberation, it aims to commemorate and convey the suffering and hopes of those who fought along the Gothic Line in the Second World War.