La Specola
Specola is a Museum of Zoology and Natural History in Florence, established in 1771 at the instigation of Peter Leopold of Habsburg-Lothringen, Archduke of Austria and Grand Duke of Tuscany. It is located in Via Romana 17, close to the Palazzo Pitti.
The museum collection is based on the natural history collection of the Medici family and was especially known for his collection of anatomical wax models from the 18th and 19th centuries over Florence also. Specola is the oldest science museum in Europe. His name (English: the observatory ) goes back to the construction of an observatory in the 18th century. Specola today is one of the departments of the Museum of Natural History in Florence, belonging to the University.
History
Grand Duke Peter Leopold (1747-1792) decided in 1771 to merge the Grand Ducal Collections of Natural History in Florence and this - inspired by the ideas of the Enlightenment - make available to the public. The purpose of the reorganization, he transferred Felice Fontana (1730-1805), a naturalist, anatomist and physician, in order großherzoglichem oversaw the Medicean art and Wunderkammer in the Palazzo Pitti since 1766. 1771 Peter Leopold acquired the Palazzo Torri Giani family in the Via Romana, close to the Palazzo Pitti, along with several adjacent buildings and had rebuilt the complex for the collection. The financing of his museum denied Peter Leopold by selling valuable items from the possession of the Medici, although these had been bequeathed by will of Florence. The core collection of the museum were above all the stocks in the Uffizi Gallery, the curiosities of the Wunderkammer of the Medici, and the tools and equipment of Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) and the Accademia del Cimento, founded in 1667 by students of Galileo. For the purposes of an overall view of animal, plant and human life caused Felice Fontana, ordered by Peter Leopold to Director, creating anatomical models in wax, which originated in the collaboration between artists, anatomists and craftsmen.
On 21 February 1775, the collection was opened as the Imperial Regio Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale ( Imperial and Royal Museum of Physics and Natural History ). There were separate visiting hours for the educated and for the people who had to appear in " cleanly clothing ". For an extension of the museum to meteorological and astronomical stocks Peter Leopold in 1780 prompted the construction of a Osservatorio Astronomico (Italian: la specola ), which gave the entire museum its name later.
Under Ferdinand III. (1769-1824), the museum lost its status as a major site of European knowledge. From the founding of the Istituto di Studi e di Superiori Perfezionamento ( Institute for Advanced Studies and Training ) in 1859 was 1923, the University of Florence forth. Specola heard today as one of six departments of the Museo di Storia Naturale, with its building in Via Romana, now the Institute of Physics and Natural Sciences, the University and has the official name of the Museo di Storia Naturale dell'Università di Firenze, La sezione the zoologia specola.
The holdings comprise a total of about 3,500,000 pieces, collected 1770-1850. Exhibited are about 5,500 copies. On the top floor of the building in Via Romana 22 rooms accommodate the zoological collection, for the most part in their original display cases from the 18th and 19th century. In ten rooms, the wax anatomical models are shown. A room is available for temporary exhibitions. On the first floor the Tribuna di Galileo, which was opened in 1841 is located. There are next to a statue of the Italian scholar Galileo Galilei, whose memory is preserved and the instruments of the Accademia del Cimento. The ground floor of the hall with skeletons.
The zoological collection consists of specimens of invertebrates, reptiles, fish, birds and mammals, including the old preparation of a hippo. The collection of anatomical models in wax consists of characters from the 18th and 19th centuries. To watercolors are of human organs, each including the replicas in wax on the walls of the halls. In the middle of the rooms are in display cases, which were designed in part with velvet, shown lying human body made of wax in different anatomical conditions. A number of small-scale scenes from wax by Gaetano Zumbo (1656-1701), formerly in the collection of the Medici, shows allegories of transience.