Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Siena

Siena’s National Archaeological Museum occupies sandstone galleries and brick-built rooms in the lower levels of the Santa Maria della Scala complex. Its collections bring together archaeological finds from across the province, tracing a regional history from prehistory through the Etruscan and Roman periods.

Why it matters

The museum’s collection took shape from several earlier groups of antiquities and archaeological discoveries. In the 1920s, Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli began its scientific organization. Materials from the Accademia dei Fisiocritici and the Bargagli collection from Sarteano were installed in Via della Sapienza between 1931 and 1933. The Regio Museo Archeologico was formally established in 1941. Later additions included collections donated by the Chigi Zondadari family in 1951 and acquired from Emilio Bonci Casuccini in 1953. In 2001, the museum moved to the lowest levels of Santa Maria della Scala.

What to notice

The Etruscan alabaster cinerary urns from Sarteano include scenes from Greek myth, among them Iphigenia and Orestes in Tauris, the deaths of Clytemnestra and Aegisthus, and the story of Hippolytus. The Anfora Griccioli, an Attic black-figure amphora made in Athens around 530 BC, was found in a tomb at Campassini, in the territory of Monteriggioni. A sculpted head discovered in Siena in 1930 was first identified as Seneca; the museum now describes it as the so-called Pseudo-Seneca, with several possible identifications as a Greek poet. Other works include a Bronze Age axe found near Porta Pispini, a late-Archaic Etruscan stele from Toiano and fibulae from Rosia.

Context and history

The sandstone galleries and brick-built spaces of Santa Maria della Scala form a contrasting setting for the ancient material. Their adaptation as museum rooms places the archaeological collections within a former hospital complex that preserves many different periods of Siena’s history.