Description
The so-called historical collections include works not linked to the Parma area and which came to the Museum through gifts, acquisitions of entire collections or even individual purchases on the antiques market, mostly made in the first half of the nineteenth century.
At the time, the first excavations in the Etruscan necropolises had awakened considerable interest in new classes of materials, such as ceramics, bronze objects and terracotta. Over the course of about two decades, the director of the Museum, Michele Lopez, with an intense work of purchases and exchanges made possible by the donations of the Luigino government, managed to build up a large and significant collection of finds. The Greek vases, mostly from Vulci, well document the production of the Geometric Age (9th-7th century BC), as do the Attic black-figure and red-figure vases, whose subjects are taken from mythology and everyday life.
Magna Graecia is represented by a large number of Apulian vases (from today’s Puglia), including both containers attributable to the local ceramic tradition and examples of clear Greek inspiration.
Among the materials of Etruscan origin there are both pottery, with jugs, chalices and cups in bucchero, and terracotta objects (votive heads, cinerary urns and urn lids), as well as various bronzes, including refined mirrors, votive statuettes and a splendid Corinthian-type helmet.
Bibliography
Dei, eroi ed offerenti: la collezione di bronzetti etrusco-italici del Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Parma, Marco Cavalieri, Bruxelles-Roma, Istituto Storico Belga di Roma, 2006
Oltre il riflesso: storia, iconografia e società negli specchi etruschi del Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Parma, Marco Cavalieri and Giacomo Baldini, Bruxelles-Roma, Istituto Storico Belga di Roma, 2013
Guida al Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Parma, a cura di Mirella Marini Calvani, Ravenna, Essegi, 2001
Artworks and Collections
