Musei Civici di Arte Antica - Lapidario Civico - Ferrara

Ferrara’s oldest museum was inaugurated in 1735 at Palazzo Paradiso by the Marquis Ercole Bevilacqua. Since 1984 it has been housed in the former Church of Santa Libera. The original core of the collection, comprising ancient marble items from throughout the city and its surroundings - and sometimes re-used in places of worships, such as the sarcophagus of Annia Faustina from the Church of Santo Stefano – was augmented over time by the 18th century Baruffaldi, Scalabrini, and Riminaldi donations, and by recent acquisitions, including the sarcophagus of Aurelia Eutychia, one of the most important such items from the Cisalpine Republic. In addition to local material, the museum also holds inscribed marble items from various locations, testifying to the prevailing taste in the House of Este. The museum’s exhibits begin with epigraphs donated by Ercole d’Este and Ercole Bevilacqua, respectively the stele of Caesii and that of Antonia Valeria. They continue with topographic exhibits comprising funerary monuments, steles, sarcophagi, and tombstones, including a sarcophagus of the gens Aurelia, originally located in Voghenza, the altar of Fronto and the tombstone of Octavius, which come from the Po di Primaro, a former branch of the Po river. There are also interesting documents that refer to the Po di Volano branch, and a collection of steles from Gambulaga.