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Ministero del Turismo
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Museo archeologico della civiltà messapica

Museums and collections Poggiardo

Palazzo Baronale di Vaste, sede del museo: torre merlata in pietra con balcone, accanto un loggiato ad archi; davanti, lampione e una palma. (

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The story translated into Italian Sign Language by an interpreter.

The Archaeological Museum of the Messapian Civilization is located in Vaste, a district of Poggiardo, in the Baronial Palace in Piazza Dante, built and modified in several phases between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries. The entrance is dominated by a large photograph of the Messapian city walls from the fourth to third century B.C.; next to it, a red-figure crater by the Painter of Vaste and a trozzella, both from the city's necropolis. The first room features a life-size wooden reconstruction of the Hypogeum of the Caryatids, which leads to the burial chamber with the two tombs discovered in 1985 by the University of Lecce: the Tomb of the Knight and the Tomb of the Athlete. Following are the archaic monolithic cippi in Lecce stone and, on the upper floor, the finds from the Messapian necropolises between the sixth and third centuries B.C. Among the most valuable pieces is a treasure of 150 silver coins from the third century B.C., found in 1989, and the richest collection of gaming tiles ever discovered in the entire Roman world, from a cistern of the second century B.C. The last rooms tell the story of the paleochristian complex of Fondo Giuliano and medieval Vaste.

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