Address: Via S. Egidio, 21
The Museum and Florentine Institute of Prehistory was founded
in Florence in 1946 and is located in the Town Hall of the
Oblates, in order to gather, preserve and classify the
prehistoric collections existing in Florence. The collections
cover a period from the Prestone Age until historical times; they
represent the manifestations of human activity based first on a
non-productive economy of hunting and crops, then on a productive
one based on agriculture, sheepfarming, and metal work.
The evidence consists of stone instruments, bone, pottery, copper
arms, bronze; artistic evidence (impressions, photos and
originals) etc., accompanied by their respective human kinds,
faunal and botanical specimens.
They come from excavation and research in Italy and abroad
carried out in Europe, Africa, Asia and America from the
beginning of the prehistoric study in the nineteenth century;
they make up the "historical" collections. The
collections from recent investigation are remarkable, and
numerous the ones which have served to make a first chronological
and cultural classification of prehistory. Important
representations have been made accessible to the public since
1975 in an exhibition arranged on two floors which covers over
700 metres, and displayed according to a
chronological-geographical criterium starting from our region.
The display begins with a didactic room (men, animals and
artificial production in interaction).
Then follows in order of time (Middle Paleolithic) the most
impressive collections coming from cave deposits. Of note
relating to recent times is a group of impressed pottery sets,
which are decorated in graffio design and accompanied by lithic
and osseous industries.
The more recent collections follow (the Bronze Age), as far as
the limits of History (the Iron Age).
On the second floor, the European collections from the first
discoveries in the field of prehistory are of particular
interest. Also noteworthy are the African and Asiatic
collections. To point out, regards America, is the ethnographical
material.of the late prehistoric period. Noteworthy too is the
preparation of a permanent photographic exhibition of natural
size prehistoric African art made up of over 60 photomurals.
