2025 marks the 300th birthday of Father Eliseo della Concezione, professor of experimental physics at the Royal Academy of Studies of Palermo. To celebrate this anniversary, the Physics and Chemistry Library of the University Library System and History Archive and the Department of Physics and Chemistry-Emilio Segre have organized several cultural activities. In the article, after a brief biographical description of Father Eliseo della Concezione, I will present the activities carried out and discuss the historical and educational aspects of Father Eliseo's work during his stay at the Royal Academy of Palermo at the end of 18th century.
In an era in which culture must respond to the needs of a constantly evolving society, the museum experience cannot be limited to a classic, purely contemplative view of the work of art. This article analyses the evolution of the concept of the museum and offers an overview of visitor trends in Italian museums, with a particular focus on Calabria. The research adopts a descriptive approach based on the processing of statistical data provided by the Ministry of Culture (MiC) and Istat, comparing the national and regional museum systems to highlight structural, managerial and usage differences. The analysis reveals a significant increase in visitors, particularly non-paying visitors, thanks to ministerial initiatives such as "Domenica al Museo" (Sunday at the Museum). In Calabria, despite persistent difficulties related to physical and digital accessibility, examples of innovation are emerging, such as the Consentia Itinera Multimedia Museum, which integrates cultural heritage and immersive technologies. This evidence offers significant insights forfuture research aimed at building sustainable and attractive museum models that also appeal to a diverse audience.
As part of the Interreg Italy-Switzerland ALCOTRA 2014-2020 program called MiMonVe "The mines around Mont Velan", the Municipality of Ollomont (Valpelline, Aosta) recently restored part of the decommissioned chalcopyrite mines, that had been active between the early 18th century and 1952, making them accessible to the public. The Saint-Jean gallery was secured, at Balme the mine shaft was reopened and at the hamlet of Les Rey a new visitor reception was built hosting an exhibition of themes related to the mine exploitation including texts and images on forex panels, mineralogical and petrographic specimens, videos and audios with the option to access additional information via embedded QR codes. Overall, the MiMonVe project helped to preserve the memory of mining at Ollomont, to protect its historical identity, to create a themed cultural and tourist trail and to establish a new documentation center on geo-mineralogical, mining and metallurgical technology topics for schools, visitors and researchers.
On November 18th, 2024, the Slender-billed Curlew Numenius tenuirostris was declared globally extinct with a probability of 96,0%*. In presenting the specimen that belonged to the "Orazio & Raffaele Antinori" Collection of Perugia (Umbria, central Italy), still unknown to the scientific community, the contribution also introduces a brief focus on the dynamics of the species in Italy since the early 1960s.
Among the collections at the University of Parma's Museum of Naturalistic Historiography is a small series of taxidermy specimens in glass ampules, perfectly preserved after nearly three centuries. This collection is what remains of the 18th-century ornithological cabinet of Father Jean Baptiste Fourcault, a friar of the Minim Order who helped establish the Parma Museum. The specimens possess intriguing qualities that make them quite mysterious. They were created using an innovative method in which the taxidermized animals and their accompanying objects were inserted into glass vials through entry holes smaller than their size, then sealed like time capsules. Collectors and enthusiasts have long tried to uncover the secret of such a creation, but without success. Modern analytical techniques have reconstructed the materials and methods used, unraveling the mystery that Father Fourcault never revealed to anyone.
This essay examines three historical constellations in which natural history museums engaged-either by avoiding or by literally constructing-the metaphorical link to Noah's Ark. First, it explores Richard Owen's (1804-1892) mid-nineteenth-century plans for a metropolitan natural history museum in London. Second, it analyzes the post-World War II use of the ark as a metaphor for the natural history museum. Third, it considers creationist museums that abandon metaphor altogether, presenting the Biblical Flood as a historical reality and a foundational principle of Earth's history. In particular, the essay compares creationist museums recently established in South America by the Seventh-day Adventist Church with two contemporary American venues: the Ark Encounter and the Creation Museum, both founded in the early twenty-first century in Kentucky, USA. Promoted by Young Earth creationists, these projects transform the ark-museum metaphor into a literal display affirming the historicity of the Book of Genesis.
Paleoantropological museum of San Daniele Po is the home of Paus. Paus is the nickname of the most important fossil found along the banks of the Po: it is the frontal bone of a neanderthal man discovered near the city of Cremona in 2009. Born in 1998, this museum preserves mammal's fossils dating back to the last stages of the Pleistocene, mostly animals of Ice Age Wurm: giant deer, mammoth, elk, steppe bison and many others.
The Prehistoric Museum of Terra Amata (Nice, France) opened its doors on September 16, 1976, in the Port district in Nice. It is a "site museum" dedicated to presenting the Paleolithic deposit of Terra Amata. The museum illustrates the behavior and lifestyle of the earliest inhabitants of Nice within their environment, between 400,000 and 380,000 years ago. Located directly on the archaeological site, the Terra Amata Museum preserves the remains left by Homo heidelbergensis ni & ccedil;ois around 400,000 years ago. Visitors can explore the behavior and ways of life of these humans, at once so close and yet so distant from us, who built huts on a beach and hunted elephants, deer, and rabbits. They also kindled fires at the center of their successive dwellings, thereby creating hearths that are among the earliest ever discovered worldwide. Since its opening, the Terra Amata Museum of Prehistory has played an active role in disseminating knowledge of Prehistory through a wide range of initiatives.
The present research deals with four minor museums in Tuscany which took their origin from private bird collections established in the second half of the 19th century and linked to the "Inchiesta Ornitologica" [Ornithological Inquiry] of Enrico Hillyer Giglioli: the Beni Collection (by Carlo Beni, from the district of Casentino, Arezzo), the Gragnani-Rontani Collection (by Raimondo Gragnani, from the district of Massaciuccoli, Lucca), the Lensi Collection (by Adolfo Lensi, from the district of Fucecchio, Firenze) and the Panciatichi Paulucci Collection (by Marianna Panciatichi Ximenes d'Aragona Paulucci, from the district of San Gimignano, Siena). The four collectors provided abundant information about their areas, later published in the "Resoconti" (a series of periodic reports which were compiled by all the correspondents). Considering their typically local peculiarity and thanks to their wide representativeness, these collections supply an exhaustive picture of the bird species present in the territories covered by these ornithologists at the end of the 19th century.
This study presents the results of research and cataloging of metallic seals for steam boilers and vessels, which began with the fortuitous discovery of a metal disc featuring the Savoy coat of arms. The analysis was performed on artifacts collected both in the field and online, with the goal of reconstructing their history and cultural significance. The text classifies 165 seals, 150 individual pieces and 15 still attached to their plates, dividing them into six main types based on the state emblem, dating, and physical characteristics. The first type (from 1890) is made of copper with the Savoy coat of arms; the second type (1927-1929) is the rarest, featuring the Savoy coat of arms and the fasces; the third type (1929-1930) has the Savoy coat of arms fused with the fasces; the fourth type (after 1946) is of thinner copper with the emblem of the Italian Republic; the fifth type (early 1950s) is thicker and heavier, with the acronym "A.N.C.C." (Associazione Nazionale peril Controllo della Combustione); and the sixth type (1970s) is made of a thin aluminum sheet with a black background. The study highlights the importance of these artifacts as a testament to the social and political transformations in Italy between the 19th and 20th centuries, with particular reference to the regulation of industrial safety. The authors conclude by hypothesizing that the seals were minted by the Royal Mint of the State.
Among the collections of theMuseo di Storia Naturale "Antonio Stoppani", is counted a series of 130 educational panels from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, from the Seminary of Monza. Some of these wall panels have been created by student as an example of their artistic expression. This was the case of the panel made by the painter Gabriele Brunati, which already reveals the talent of a next exponent of Lombard Realism of the late nineteenth century.
In the article we present some historical scientific instruments of the Historical Collection of Physics Instruments of the University of Palermo. We will focus on the artificial light sources used for teaching and research in physics since the 19th century. After an introduction on the historical development of artificial light sources and their operating principle, we describe the physical characteristics of some of the most representative instruments in the collection.
The historical naturalistic collections of the Padova University are reunited in the large Museum of Nature and Man The alternating events of four naturalistic museums of the University of Padua, which share their origins in the eighteenth-century collection of Antonio Vallisneri senior, are retraced over the centuries until their confluence in the great Museum of Nature and Man, inaugurated following the celebrations for the eight hundred years of this University.
Thanks to the PNRRfunds on accessibility received, the Museo dei Saperi e delle Mirabilia siciliane of the University of Catania has promoted educational and sensorial initiatives over the last year to improve its educational offer through a more inclusive multidisciplinary approach and innovative STEM study. Starting from a reflection on the theme of educational poverty, it was created the museum itinerary "The Museum for all the Senses", described here, as the result of an interdisciplinary laboratory with the collaboration of various local actors, including schools and voluntary associations. The itinerary, expanding an already tested first pilot edition through a multi-sensory installation based on Design for All, aims to promote values such as territorial belonging, cultural identity, the richness of diversity, in line with the objectives of the 2030 UN Agenda, the EURecommendations on Lifelong Learning and the regional Three-Year Plan for early school leaving.
We report on a pivotal collaborative experience of study and reconnection when Gliceria Tupinamba (Indigenous artist, activist, anthropologist, and community leader) andJessica Tupinamba (Indigenous lawyer and activist) encountered the Tupinamba artefacts conserved at the Florentine Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology. We contextualize the event with information on the Tupinamba feather capes and clubs preserved in Florence. We comment on the potential impact and importance of this event, both for the Museum and for the Tupinamba community. We stress the importance of collaboration among people with different expertise and tasks fully realizing that scientific and spiritual approaches are not incompatible. Combining different approaches both interdisciplinary and inter-culturally opens up a brighter future dialogue about cultural heritage preserved in museums. Additionally, we disseminate, for the first time, information on a feather Tupinamba cape that arrived in Florence during Medici times, but was lost in Germany during WWII.
We present the study of a recently discovered herbarium in the Sant Ignasi School- Jesuits of Sarria (Barcelona, Spain), which contains 136 specimens collected in Italy between the years 1934-1938, among them 122 cormophytes, 13 lichens and 1 algae. Among the lichens there are 5 new UTM 10x10 km localities. Part of the herbarium has been identified as the work of the Salesian botanist Giacomo Gresino (1859-1946).
Vincenzo Mazza (1793-1859) is a neglected figure in the history of Italian veterinary medicine. His collection represents the first nucleus of the future Anatomical Museum of the Neapolitan Veterinary School. After the Napoleonic wars, in which he took part as a military veterinarian, he attended the School of Milano, where he learnt to prepare the anatomical specimens from Jean Louis Leroy and Giambattista Volpi. In 1816 he graduated in Medicine and Philosophy in Pisa, where he learnt Andrea Vacc & agrave; Berlinghieri's innovative surgical techniques and established a private veterinary school. In 1821, he was appointed Professor in Theoretical and Practical Clinic at the Veterinary School in Napoli, where he also directed the adjoining hospital. Here, he privately and independently produced his anatomical preparations for educational purposes and tried in vain to create a museum within the School modelled on the one in Milano and other major European schools. Unfortunately, after 1848, he fell victim to Borbonic political repression and was forced to leave teaching. Most of his specimens are still preserved in excellent condition in the "Museo di Anatomia Veterinaria" of the Federico II Napoli University.
In this article we tested the assumption that nineteenth century ethnological collectionism was restricted towards "pure", uncontaminated and "primitive" objects. We choose as a case study the 1886 ethnographic collection of Elio Modigliani (Florence, 1860- Viareggio, 1932) from Nias, an island North-West of Sumatra. Modigliani was a paradigmatic figure of the 19th century scientific collector and he supposedly followed these collection criteria. However, our study on the collection as well as primary sources reveals that Modigliani intentionally collected objects and artifacts that were contaminated "from outside" contacts. Indeed, Modigliani even investigated how these new elements were included and integrated into Nias material culture.
The paper aims to reflect on the state of education in contemporary museology, or rather within the context of so-called postmodern museology. Through a reflective process that does not intend to be definitive, it focuses on three distinctive elements that highlight some significant opportunities and challenges in the field: the harmonization between educational and learning approaches in museum education; the limited familiarity of museums with the practices and context of educational research; and lastly, the transdisciplinary vision in the interpretation and representation of museum heritage as an opportunity of cultural and social relevance within a generative and transformative vision of culture.
The Correspondence of Antonio Bottini (1850-1931), kept in the Archive of the Botanic Museum of the University of Pisa, is presented. There are 3397 numbered documents, dated between 1873 and 1931, which include letters, illustrated postcards, postcards, tickets, letter drafts and postal receipts. There are 404 Italian and European correspondents, including professors, amateur botanists and "religious-scientists". Most of the letters come from Italy, followed by Germany, France and Switzerland, including many other European countries.
