Antiquarium Silio Italico

The Silio Italico Antiquarium preserves finds from Vico Equense's pre-Roman necropoleis. Pottery, bronze vessels and personal ornaments illuminate a community connected with Greek, Etruscan and Italic cultural worlds.

Why it matters

Burial assemblages provide important evidence for the ancient settlement, whose domestic remains are less well understood. Imported objects reveal contacts across the Mediterranean, while local wares show the material practices of the peninsula's inhabitants.

What to notice

Attic black-figure and red-figure pottery contrasts with dark Etruscan bucchero and coarser impasto vessels. Transport amphorae connect the burial finds with maritime trade. Bronze cauldrons, basins and pouring vessels add another dimension to the goods placed with the dead.

The relationship between objects within individual tomb groups helps explain status, ritual and the funerary banquet rather than treating each vessel as an isolated work of art.

Context and history

Excavations from the 1960s uncovered necropolis areas associated with the ancient settlement, including Via Nicotera. The antiquarium was instituted in 1995 and opened in 2001 in the historic municipal building. Its name honours the Latin poet Silius Italicus.