Museo dei Grandi Fiumi

The Museum of the Great Rivers in Rovigo occupies the former Olivetan monastery of San Bartolomeo. Its displays trace the archaeology, history and environment of the Polesine, the region between the Po and Adige, from prehistory to the Renaissance.

Why it matters

The museum grew from the civic collection established in 1978 and opened in 1980. The renewed Museo dei Grandi Fiumi was instituted in 1998 and opened its first section in 2001. Its chronological approach links archaeological discoveries across the province with the landscape shaped by the two rivers. The monastery itself, begun in the thirteenth century and expanded under the Olivetans, forms part of this layered history.

What to notice

Finds include amber from the Bronze Age site of Campestrin, the Etruscan bronze known as the Cavaliere di Gavello, and an Attic crater and cup from fifth-century BC tombs at Balone. Roman material includes finds from the villa of Chiunsano and an Ostrogoth-era burial. Renaissance maiolica by Francesco Xanto Avelli connects Rovigo with the court of Urbino. The museum's two cloisters include a wellhead attributed to Jacopo Sansovino and columns whose design has been attributed to Biagio Rossetti. A Roman lapidary is displayed in the courtyard. Gabbris Ferrari's sketches are presented in the room Il Museo in Scena, opened in 2022.

Context and history

The complex began under the Umiliati in the first half of the thirteenth century. The Olivetans took over in the second half of the fifteenth century, with patronage from the Roverella brothers, and enlarged the monastery in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. After Napoleonic suppression in 1810, Giacomo Giro ceded the building to the commune in 1844 for use as a home for the poor. Restoration in the 1990s prepared the complex for cultural use. The museum's later archaeological sections opened in stages from 2002 to 2014, with additional interpretive rooms introduced in 2022.