Civico museo di storia naturale Don Michelangelo Ambrosioni

About the museum

The museum grew out of the passion for natural sciences and the teaching of Don Michelangelo Ambrosioni, who taught natural history at the Collegio Manzoni in Merate between the late 19th and early 20th centuries. During his travels in Italy and Europe he collected specimens to build a teaching collection; after his death the material was donated to the municipality of Merate.

For many years the collections remained in Villa Confalonieri, then the seat of the municipality. In the eighties they were recovered and rearranged in several rooms of the former Collegio Manzoni, where the Museum of Natural History, devoted to the mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology collections, opened on 4 December 1988. In 1991 the Lazzarini Room was added, dedicated to the Resistance in Merate and to officer Giacinto Lazzarini. From 1995 the second floor has housed the petrographic collection and the botany and physics rooms.

Today the route presents minerals, igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks, fossils, shells and animals, as well as more than one hundred and thirty physics instruments used in schools and a display case on the flora and fauna of the Lago di Sartirana Nature Reserve. In 2010 the museum joined the Museum System of the Province of Lecco.

Highlights

• Mineral collection with 170 specimens on display, including a 42 cm fluorite
• Petrographic collection of igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks
• Palaeontology section with plant and animal fossils and an open storage area
• Early 20th-century fox diorama
• Physics room with over 130 laboratory instruments
• Lazzarini Room on the Resistance in Merate

Permanent exhibitions

• Collezioni naturalistiche – Minerals, rocks, fossils, shells and animals, with an open storage area and a display case on the Lago di Sartirana Nature Reserve.
• Sala di fisica – Over 130 laboratory instruments for the study of optics, acoustics and mechanics, used in schools.
• Sala Lazzarini – Documents, photographs and memorabilia of officer Giacinto Lazzarini and of Merate's history during the Second World War.

Founded

1988

Operated by

Comune di Merate

Admission & discounts

Admission is free.

Admission is free.

Accessibility

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Kids & families

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Getting there & parking

The museum entrance is in the courtyard next to the civic library, in the former Collegio Manzoni.

Amenities & dining

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Events & venue rental

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