Description
La Spezia's Seal Museum holds more than fifteen hundred seals, from the first stamps of the Fertile Crescent to Fabergé jewels: six thousand years of history, each just a few centimeters across. It is on Via del Prione, in the neo-medieval Palazzina delle Arti.
It is one of the most complete collections of seals in existence, arranged by period and place. The tour shows how the impression, born to mark and to sign, became an amulet, a jewel and a work of art.
The first room starts with the seal matrices from Anatolia and Iran from the late 4th millennium BC. Next come the Egyptian scarabs in stone and faience, amulets as well as seals, and the Roman rings with bezels of carnelian or glass paste.
Among the medieval and Renaissance pieces is the seal of the humanist Flavio Biondo. Then there are bronze stamps of dioceses and confraternities, wax and lead impressions from the papal chanceries and molds for Eucharistic bread from the 5th and 6th centuries.
The 18th and 19th centuries were the golden age of the seal: silver, ivory, tortoiseshell, porcelain. The most fun are the curious seals, hidden in walking sticks, hammers, perfume bottles and corkscrews.
Also look for the glass and crystal seals by René Lalique, master of Art Nouveau, and the bronze handles with statuettes signed by great French sculptors, including Joseph Bosio, known as "the French Canova".
The second room, dedicated to Lilian Capellini, is that of the jewel seals in gold and precious stones and of the pieces by Fabergé, the tsars' goldsmith. Here there is a seal that Queen Victoria gave to her grandson Albert of Prussia.
The last room takes you to the East, from the 4th century BC to today: small archaic bronze matrices, seals in ivory, horn and crystal, and the Chinese seals created by great calligraphers and painters of the 19th and 20th centuries. Other seals come from pre-Columbian America, Japan and the Islamic world.
The collection is the fruit of thirty years of research by Lilian and Euro Capellini, who donated it to the city: the museum opened in 2000. The building that houses it was designed in 1924 by Franco Oliva as the seat of the Health Office.
Don't miss
• The Egyptian scarabs.
• The curious seals.
• The Lalique seals.
• The Fabergé pieces.
Did you know?
• In the jewel room there is a small mushroom-shaped matrix, made for the Russian Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich.
• A jade seal in the Oriental section belonged to the Countess of Bismarck.
It is one of the most complete collections of seals in existence, arranged by period and place. The tour shows how the impression, born to mark and to sign, became an amulet, a jewel and a work of art.
The first room starts with the seal matrices from Anatolia and Iran from the late 4th millennium BC. Next come the Egyptian scarabs in stone and faience, amulets as well as seals, and the Roman rings with bezels of carnelian or glass paste.
Among the medieval and Renaissance pieces is the seal of the humanist Flavio Biondo. Then there are bronze stamps of dioceses and confraternities, wax and lead impressions from the papal chanceries and molds for Eucharistic bread from the 5th and 6th centuries.
The 18th and 19th centuries were the golden age of the seal: silver, ivory, tortoiseshell, porcelain. The most fun are the curious seals, hidden in walking sticks, hammers, perfume bottles and corkscrews.
Also look for the glass and crystal seals by René Lalique, master of Art Nouveau, and the bronze handles with statuettes signed by great French sculptors, including Joseph Bosio, known as "the French Canova".
The second room, dedicated to Lilian Capellini, is that of the jewel seals in gold and precious stones and of the pieces by Fabergé, the tsars' goldsmith. Here there is a seal that Queen Victoria gave to her grandson Albert of Prussia.
The last room takes you to the East, from the 4th century BC to today: small archaic bronze matrices, seals in ivory, horn and crystal, and the Chinese seals created by great calligraphers and painters of the 19th and 20th centuries. Other seals come from pre-Columbian America, Japan and the Islamic world.
The collection is the fruit of thirty years of research by Lilian and Euro Capellini, who donated it to the city: the museum opened in 2000. The building that houses it was designed in 1924 by Franco Oliva as the seat of the Health Office.
Don't miss
• The Egyptian scarabs.
• The curious seals.
• The Lalique seals.
• The Fabergé pieces.
Did you know?
• In the jewel room there is a small mushroom-shaped matrix, made for the Russian Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich.
• A jade seal in the Oriental section belonged to the Countess of Bismarck.