ArtsAutosBooksBusinessEducationEntertainmentFamilyFashionFoodGamesGenderHealthHolidaysHomeHubPagesPersonal FinancePetsPoliticsReligionSportsTechnologyTravel

Ten Unusual Museums in Italy - Strange Places to Visit in Umbria

Updated on April 21, 2012
Wine Museum
Wine Museum

Collections, Exhibitions and Shows in Umbria

The central province of the Italian peninsula, Umbria has so much to offer in the way of excellent museums, exhibitions and galleries. Just about every village and town has a Pinacoteca Comunale, Museo or Galleria for you to look around. What always defines an area are those small, unique collections that have been assembled and are quite often particular to a specific location.

The communities around Umbria have amassed great compilations of Renaissance artworks, frescoes and paintings; they have a prodigious amount of religious relics and collections of Roman and Etruscan artefacts in every hill town. There are also a number of interesting, unique, unusual and sometimes-wierd local museums around Umbria that are worth a visit if you are looking for things to. 

Miniature Museum
Miniature Museum

10 Things to do in Umbria, Italy

1) Museo dell’Olio, the Oil Museum in Torgiano. Opened in 2000 this collection in the south of Umbria explains and demonstrates the processes and botany associated with the production of the regions famous golden olive oils. The museum has a number of antiques oil presses and equipment related to oil production.

2) Mummies of Ferentillo, a macabre exhibition of bodies buried beneath the Church of Santo Stefano in the village. The bodies date back to the 1500’s when they were intruded, during the Napoleonic reign of the area it was decreed that burials were forbidden within the boundaries of towns and villages and so the mummies of Ferentillo were discovered. After all the years the grim finds included adults, children, priests and pilgrims, many were still clothed, with hair, beards, skin and teeth.

3) Botteghe Artigiane in Miniatura, Museum of Miniatures in the old town centre of Citta di Castello is a wonderful collection of precepi, nativity scenes and townscapes crafted in perfect miniature detail. The displays recreate the people, occupations and trades prevalent in the Upper Tiber Valley over the centuries in splendid tiny models.

4) Historical Museum of Chocolate, Perugia. The town is famous for its festival of chocolate, Eurochoc every October and the museum acts as a permanent feature dedicated to the sweet treat. The museum is part of the Perugina chocolate factory, who make Baci chocolates, you can also have guided tours of the works and see chocolate being produced.

5) Battle of Lake Trasimeno Museum, Tuoro sul Trasimeno houses an exhibition dedicated to the famous battle in 217 BC, between Hannibal and the Roman consul Cauis Flaminius. The museum fully explains the battle and includes some fine archaeological finds from period. Heavily outnumbered on the shores of the Lake Trasimeno, Hannibal carried out one of the greatest ambushes in history.

6) Museo de Archeologia Arborea, in San Lorenzo, Lerchi in the Upper Tiber Valley. Here there is a living tree museum, which promotes and preserves a large number of native Italian trees. Many breeds that have fallen out of favour are often forgotten and in danger of becoming extinct. The museum dutifully tends and cares for 150 rare local fruit trees ensuring their survival.

7) Museo del Tulle, The Lace making Museum in Panicale, near Lake Trasimeno. Dedicated to the life, designs and works of a remarkable woman, Anita Bellischi and the local school she established nearby that taught many local women the delicate craft of lace work and gain financial independence and security for themselves.

8) World of Model Soldiers Museum, La Preghiera, Calzolaro. On the plains of the luscious Seano valley north of Umbertide is the restored medieval monastic estate, La Preghiera. Now a B&B hotel it houses an interesting collection of over 30,000 toy lead soldiers and militaria, prints, uniforms and flags.

9) Museo del Vino, Wine Museum of Torgiano. Established by the Lungarotti family who have produced wine in the region for decades, this exhibition explains and demonstrates the history and equipment have been used over the centuries in bringing a bottle of the good stuff to our dinner tables.

10) Museum of Emigration examines the stories behind the thousands of Italians that left their homeland between 1800 and 1950 and travelled around all four corners of the world. Located on the foothills of the Apennine Mountains, in the Palazzo Podesta in Gualdo Tadino the museum provides an interesting piece of Italian social history.

Other Umbrian Hubs

Eurochoc Festival in Perugia

Ten Ususual Festivals in Umbria

Five Christmas Festivals in Umbria

Eat your Way Around Umbria

Carsulae, the Pompeii of Umbria

working

This website uses cookies

As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.

For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy

Show Details
Necessary
HubPages Device IDThis is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons.
LoginThis is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service.
Google RecaptchaThis is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy)
AkismetThis is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Traffic PixelThis is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized.
Amazon Web ServicesThis is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy)
CloudflareThis is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy)
Google Hosted LibrariesJavascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy)
Features
Google Custom SearchThis is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy)
Google MapsSome articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
Google ChartsThis is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy)
Google AdSense Host APIThis service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Google YouTubeSome articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
VimeoSome articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
PaypalThis is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook LoginYou can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
MavenThis supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy)
Marketing
Google AdSenseThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Google DoubleClickGoogle provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Index ExchangeThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
SovrnThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook AdsThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Unified Ad MarketplaceThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
AppNexusThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
OpenxThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Rubicon ProjectThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
TripleLiftThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Say MediaWe partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy)
Remarketing PixelsWe may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites.
Conversion Tracking PixelsWe may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service.
Statistics
Author Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy)
ComscoreComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Tracking PixelSome articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy)
ClickscoThis is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy)