The Collection

The Da Rio room has the charm of a wunderkammer (chamber of wonders), word used to designate the private collection that anticipated the modern museum. It houses part of collection of the Paduan nobleman Nicolò Da Rio (1765 - 1845) which included more than 4000 finds among minerals, rocks, fossils, histocrical and artistic objects, “mirabilia”. The collection displayed in nineteenth-century showcases concerns minerals, rocks and fossils of various origin. The local rocks were useful to Da Rio to try to settle the heated debate of the time about the origin of Euganean Hills and as base of study for his most important written work: Orittologia euganea.