Brescia/Santa Giulia Museo della Citta' (1)

This past weekend I visited the Museo della Citta' in Brescia (Northern Italy), and am convinced that it is one of Italy's best-kept secrets. The museum, housed in a former monastery and a couple of church buildings and located on a street that follows the path of the ancient Decumanus Maximus of the Roman city Brixia, is enormous. It has two itineraries: one which takes you through the history of the town and its surroundings from the prehistoric period all the way through the Venetian period. The other itinerary takes you through the history of the monastery. This post and the next (at least) will focus on some highlights of the first itinerary, and I'll try to do another post on the second. For interested parties, here are some links for the museum: one, two, three.

(Some of these photographs will be blurry, since parts of the museum were a little dark and the use of a flash is not allowed.)

The exhibit on the Roman period had several milestones from the area from the late antique period (Constantine, Valens, Valentinian, etc.). Here is one example:

They also had fragments of fresco from a Republican temple on display. I especially like the second with it's imitation of different types of marble veneer:


That's all I have time for at the moment, but I'll try to continue the series soon.