Museo dell'Arciconfraternita dei Genovesi

Museum in Cagliari with paintings, statues, silverware, vestments and documents of the Arciconfraternita dei Genovesi, largely from the 17th century.

Opening hoursFree admission

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About the museum

The Genoese community had been present in Cagliari since the 11th century and reached its greatest prosperity in the 17th century, when the old church on Via Manno was built. A papal bull of 1591 raised the association to an archconfraternity. After the church was destroyed by Allied bombing on 13 May 1943, the confraternity built a new one, dedicated to Genoa's patron saints, Saints George and Catherine, on the Monte Urpinu hill.

The museum, opened in 1999 to preserve the identity of Cagliari's citizens of Genoese origin, occupies the premises of the archconfraternity next to the church. Its rooms, spread over the ground floor and first floor, hold paintings, statues, silverware, vestments and archive documents, largely from the 17th century, and are not arranged by chronology or style. The objects come above all from the old church and from purchases made over the centuries on Ligurian art markets.

Among the main pieces are the processional group of the martyrdom of Saint Catherine by Giuseppe Anfosso (1792), a painting from 1620–1630, a 17th-century processional cross and an 18th-century monstrance. A collection of textiles spans from the 17th to the early 20th century. The most precious document is the parchment volume of the Constitutions of 1596, the oldest statutes of any Sardinian archconfraternity and the only ones on the island written in Italian.

Highlights

Processional group of the martyrdom of Saint Catherine by Giuseppe Anfosso (1792)
Constitutions of the archconfraternity of 1596, in Italian
17th-century processional cross and 18th-century monstrance
Vestments from the 17th to the early 20th century
Objects that survived the bombing of 1943

Permanent exhibition

Collezione dell'Arciconfraternita dei Genovesi – Paintings, statues, silverware, vestments and archive documents, largely from the 17th century, from the old church destroyed in 1943.

Founded: 1999
Operated by: Arciconfraternita dei Genovesi dei Santi Giorgio e Caterina