Museo Archeologico Provinciale di Salerno

The Provincial Archaeological Museum of Salerno traces the history of the province from prehistoric settlements to the Roman period. Its best-known object is a bronze head of Apollo, recovered from the Gulf of Salerno by fishermen in 1930.

Why it matters

Founded in 1927, the museum has been housed since 1964 in the medieval complex of San Benedetto. Its collections bring together finds from cave sites, Etruscan and Samnite burial grounds, and Roman settlements. The bronze Apollo, dated to the first century BC, became an emblem of the provincial museum collections. Some scholars attribute it to the Campanian sculptor Pasiteles.

What to notice

The collections span prehistory, Iron Age cultures and the Greek and Roman periods. Neolithic and Palaeolithic material from Palinuro and the caves of Polla and Pertosa is presented alongside Villanovan cremation burials from Pontecagnano and Sala Consilina. Greek pottery and a fifth-century BC tomb from Oliveto Citra document further aspects of the region's ancient cultures.

Finds from the Etrusco-Campanian settlement of Fratte include vases painted with Greek myths. An Attic black-figure deinos attributed to the Antimenes Painter preserves evidence of an ancient repair. The bronze Apollo's sea-worn surface and traces of shells recall its recovery from the gulf.

Context and history

The museum was established in 1927 in the Palazzo di Governo. During the Second World War it moved to the Casina dell'Orto agrario, later returning to its first home. In 1964, director Venturino Panebianco selected the San Benedetto complex as its permanent location.

The monastery was built between the seventh and ninth centuries over the Hortus Magnus plateau on the eastern walls of Arechi II's defences. It became an abbey in 930 and was associated with Abbot Desiderio, later Pope Victor III, and Pope Gregory VII, who died there. Suppressed in 1807, it was used as a military district; its church later served as a royal theatre before the complex returned to the Curia. Parts of the Romanesque cloister and Renaissance loggia survive. Architect Ezio De Felice led the restoration and museum layout of 1956–1964, which received the 1966 In/Arch national prize.