Overview
Este's treasures
The Atestino National Museum is located in the sixteenth century Palazzo Mocenigo which incorporates part of the walls of the Carraresi castle, dating back to the fourteenth century. Its rooms are home to many protohistoric, Iron Age and Roman finds from the excavations conducted from the second half of the 19th century in Este, Lozzo and Arquà, as well as from the countryside of Lower Padua.
The exhibition goes in chronological order, from the oldest to the most recent artefacts, with the layout divided by themes ranging from daily life, customs and traditions to religious and funerary practices. The route starts from the first floor with the pre-protohistoric collections until it reaches the ground floor where it continues with the rich Venetian and Roman collections; it finally ends with a room that houses a small but very prestigious medieval-modern section.
Of the entire collection, the most important finds are the Situla Benvenuti, which has become a symbol of the Ancient Venetians, the rich funeral collection of Nerka Trostiaia, a powerful noblewoman who lived in the Romanisation period of Ateste, the golden medallion coined under the Empire of Augustus in 2 BC, and to finish the table Madonna with Child of Cima da Conegliano from 1504.
