MASSIMO PALACE - NATIONAL ROMAN MUSEUM (twelfth part)

BASEMENT - Large Coins Collection

Exhibit that goes from the origins of payment systems in the seventh century BC, to the earliest minting of coins, until the euro

Also Savoy Collection and Goldsmithing Section, with jewels, gems and female toiletry items almost all from FUNERARY KITS including:

“Necklace and earrings in gold” end of sixth or fifth century BC from Fidene

“Gem of Aspasios with Athena Parthenos” first century BC, carved on red jasper

“Silver mirror with relief of the myth of Frisus and Elle” Antonine period, from the estate of Vallerano

Room of the Grottarossa Little Girl

She lived in the middle of the second century AD and died at the age of about eight years

She was found mummified in 1964 in a location known as Grottarossa on the Via Cassia with her ivory doll fitted with movable joints in a “Sarcophagus with hunting scenes” inspired by an episode of the Aeneid

The child was buried with a nice tunic in Chinese fabric, a necklace of gold and sapphires, as well as gold earrings and a gold ring

There were also amulets in amber from northern Europe. All objects are exhibited in the same room of the girl

She was mummified with linen bandages impregnated with resinous and odorous substances, a practice quite common in the imperial period in Egypt and the Middle East, but very uncommon in Rome

The brain and the bowel were removed and medical tests showed that she died of a disease of the respiratory system