Museo del castagno di Pescaglia

Ethnographic museum in Colognora telling the story of the farming civilisation linked to the chestnut tree and to water, with a room dedicated to the composer Alfredo Catalani.

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About the museum

The Museo del Castagno (Chestnut Museum) was founded in Colognora, a medieval village in the Val di Roggio in the municipality of Pescaglia, on the initiative of a group of residents who formed a committee in 1978, with president Angelo Frati, to collect the objects, instruments and tools of the local farming civilisation. The premises were renovated in harmony with the medieval setting of the village, and the collection officially took the name Museo del Castagno in 1985.

The name derives from the fact that for centuries the economy of Colognora was based on two basic resources, water and chestnut, the latter a source of food and of timber for floors, roofs, huts, tools, furniture and household goods. More than a traditional museum, the collection is a set of places, rooms and finds arranged to bring back the rhythms of life and the traditions of the past.

Since 2016 the museum has also included a room dedicated to the composer Alfredo Catalani, linked to the family originally from Colognora, where autograph letters and postcards are preserved. The well-preserved village was chosen as the set for the film Miracolo a Sant’Anna by Spike Lee.

Highlights

Tools and objects of the chestnut-based farming civilisation
Rooms reconstructed in the medieval village of Colognora
Room dedicated to the composer Alfredo Catalani
Autograph letters and postcards by Catalani
Village visit, set of the film Miracolo a Sant’Anna