Museum Etnographic museum

About the museum

Cisterna's castle, seen from above, looks like a ship with the bow turned on East and the stern on West. The ramparts surruonded by the Villa, contained by the street that was defined a "moat" by the ancient toponymy, support the building next to the tower. During the centuries the fortified complex has undergone some transformations, until it is become what is nowadays.

In 1912 Emanuele Filiberto, Vittorio Emanuele and Luigi Amedeo, Princess Maria Vittoria from Pozzo della Cisterna's sons ( she was the last heir of the noble house and Amedeo the First of Aosta's, Vittorio Emanuele the Second's son, wife),  gave the castle to Cisterna city, which made it a school and the town hall.

In the 60's the City Administration decided to looking for a new building for the school and for the town hall, this choice determined a progressive degradation of the structure.

At the end of the 60's a group of young inhabitants, leaded by Lino Bartolomeo Vaudano and supported by Michelino Canta and by other people from the town, decided to save the building and with it, all the objects that represented the material culture of the territory. This group of people  started to organize the first objects in the old mint, providing to the restoration of the place.