Arheoloski Muzej Istre
Carrarina 3
Tel. (052) 218 603
+385 052351300
Official site
Open: Jun- Sep: 8am- 9am daily
Oct- May: 8:30am- 4:30pm Mon- Sat
The Archaeological Museum of Istria (Croatian: Arheološki muzej Istre, short: AMI) is an archaeological collection based in the Istrian town of Pula. Founded in 1902, the museum houses over 3,000 exhibits of prehistoric, ancient and medieval Istrian history. The museum also houses decentralized exhibition rooms in the amphitheater, the Augustus Temple, the Franciscan Monastery and the former Sacred Heart Church (Pula) in Pula, as well as in the archeological sites of Nesactium. Archaeological Museum of Istria contains vast collection of thousands of artifacts from various time periods. All of them were discovered during several archaeological digs on the Istria peninsula (North- West Croatia).
The basis for the founding of the Municipal Museum
(Museo civico) in Pula in 1902 were the discoveries of
archaeological excavations in Nesactium. With the relocation of the
Istrian Society for Archeology and Local History (Società istriana
di archeologia e storia patria) and the state collection of k.k.
k.k., located in front of all archaeological stone monuments.
Provincial Museum (Museo Provinciale) from Poreč to Pula, the
Municipal Museum was merged with this collection in 1925 into the
Regional Museum of Istria (Regio Museo dell'Istria). In 1930, the
extended museum moved into the still-used building of the former
Gymnasium Pula (built in 1890 to plans by Natale Tommasi), and the
collections were opened to the public in the same year. Towards the
end of the Second World War, the museum was closed and some of the
archaeological exhibits were transferred to Italy.
At the end
of the 1940s, under the Yugoslav administration, the museum was
reopened as the Archaeological Museum of Istria after some changes
in the area of the Lapidary and the archaeological collection.
After preserving the exhibits, which were returned from Italy until
the early sixties, the exhibition was redesigned in 1961 in the
spirit of a didactic-visual concept. In 1968, a reorganization of
the lapidarium in the rooms of the ground floor followed, in 1973
the exhibition rooms of prehistoric times on the first floor and the
antique, late antique and medieval exhibition rooms on the second
floor of the building. Even today, the collections of the
Archaeological Museum of Istria are completed with new finds from
all over Istria.