Some typical environments of the farmers from Polesine have been rebuilt in the ethnographic section: on the ground floor there are a country tavern of the 1950s and the kitchen with its characteristic fireplace; on the mezzanine there are the bedroom and the loft with children’s toys and various objects of every day.
On the walls there are lots of photographs showing some crafts of last century, most of which are now disappeared.
In every room there is a board explaining the activities that took place there and the utilization of the objects displayed:
The kitchen (cusina)
- In the kitchen, the most important room of the house, the main element is the “fogolaro” (fireplace) in which there is a “parolo” (copper pot) hanged from the “cadena” (chain).
- Near the fireplace there is the “scraranon” or “caregon” (big chair) where the “paron de casa” (master of the house, the eldest of the family) sits.
- The kitchen furniture consists of a “tola” (table) with a drawer containing “cortei” (knives), “pironi” (forks) and “cuciari” (spoons). Around the table there are some “careghe” (chairs) with wooden frame and the seat made of “careto” (swamp cane).
- In the “cardenza” (cupboard) there are tablecloths and napkins in the upper drowers and below there are plates, “pignate” (pots), “cuogome” (coffee pots), “busoloti de zucaro e de cafè” (containers for sugar and coffee), the “balanza” (scale).
- On one of the walls there is the “taca tece” (pot hanger).
- On the cupboard or on the edge of the cooker hood there are the alarm clock, some candlesticks, the “pista sale” (bowl with a pestle in wood used to crush the salt), the “moscarola” (glass container used to catch the flies), the “masenin da cafè” (coffee-grinder). The coffee beans are bought raw and then toasted in the “bala de cafè” (two semispheres with long handles) before being ground. If there is no coffee - as it often used to happen - corns or grains of barley are toasted instead.
The tavern
- The tavern is the meeting place, used to be in company, drink a glass of wine and, sometimes, conclude transactions. People talk about the local events of the day and also about the news, more or less distorted, of the great national and international events.
- In the tavern you can meet travellers, cart drivers, street vendors who quench their thirst during the dusty summer journeys or the muddy winter journeys.
- Towards evening the tavern comes to life. People play cards: briscola, tresette, scopa, bestia (Italian card games). Another gambling is the morra, that is prohibited but played everywhere: the winner will get a free litre of wine.. A thick cloud of smoke of strong cigars or strong cuts, smoked with fired clay pipes, spreads throughout the tavern.
- The innkeeper’s kitchen can provide the same food to customers who want to eat: dish of beans, bigoli (a kind of noodles) with sardines, dried salted cod, tripe.
The bedroom (camara da leto)
- In the poorest houses the bed consists of wooden boards held by trestles, on the boards there is a “paion” - bag of hemp filled with the “scartozi” (rejects of the corn-cobs). The “nizoi”(sheets) are made of “canio” (hemp).
- In the morning a “broca” (jug) full of water and a “cadin” (basin) are used to wash hands and face upon arising.
- In winter, before going to bed, people put the “munega” with the “fogara” (brazier) full of embers between the sheets. Otherwise they use the “boza” (a brass container with plug, in which there is hot water).
The last room of the mezzanine is used as a games room and educational laboratory where everybody can learn, or learn again, the games of former days, build kites, rag-dolls, small carts…
Or someone can engage in more demanding activities like, for example, the weaving by vertical loom.
In fact the Museum wants to be not only an exhibition of objects of the past, but also a place where you can bring the past back to life.
For this reason, the kitchen and the tavern become, occasionally, meeting places where you can savour the old dishes of Polesine, drink a glass of wine, play a card game while a log is burning and the polenta is cooking.
In the entrance hall of the naturalistic section, there are, first of all, some boards that show the history of the Court: formation of the land, first villages, installation of the noble Venetian family Cappello, the court evolution.
In the entrance hall the visitor is introduced to the world of birds by some boards that show their general characteristics and a big reconstruction of a Pterosaur (a reptile with wingspan of about 8 m., that lived 70 - 100 million years ago. It represents an attempt to conquer the air).
In the following rooms samples of more than 100 species of birds are put now in an order that highlights the evolutionary aspect (there are: Anatidae, Charadriidae, Laridae, Scolopacidae, Rallidae, Phalacrocoracidae, Ardeidae, Phasianidae, Accipitidrae, Falconidae, Columbidae, Cuculidae, Strigidae, Alcedinidae, Meropidae, Upupidae, Picidae, Passeriformes, etc.). For every family there is a synthetic description and for every sample there are the common name and the scientific name.
In the second room a “coegia” has been set.
It is the reproduction of a typical shelter of cane built by the hunters in the lagoons of the Po Delta.
Inside the “coegia” you can admire some of the most beautiful landscapes of the Delta: the woods, the lagoon, the beach, the high-water bed, the valley.
On the floor where there are the fireplaces, there are also models reproducing typicalness of the Delta: big huts, whistling calls for birds, fishing equipment
A large 3D board shows the routes of migration of some species of birds. Some moving templates of a cormorant, of a grey heron and of a marsh hawk hang from the ceiling.
On the walls there are illustrated boards describing the main characteristics of birds: the feathers, the flight, the beaks, the food, the nests and eyries and the nest-building places, the singing, the claws, the sex dimorphism, the courtship,…
Four big paintings show the most characteristic environments of the Po Delta (and the species of birds living here):
- The coastal environment with dunes
- The palustrine environment with cane thicket
- The valley environment
- The environment of the high-water bed
A glass case containing some samples of mammals complete the Museum route.
Click on images for zoom in and full description:
URL: http://www.smppolesine.it/ corte /eng_pagine/collezioni.php | Last update: 05 August 2011 03:08:08