Romania

The National Brukenthal Museum is a representative institution of the country,
well-known through Europe.
At its origins stand the collections acquired by the baron Samuel von Brukenthal (1721 - 1803) in the second half of the XVIIIth century.
In 1790, three years before the opening of the Luvru Museum, its collections could be visited and in 1817 this museum, the oldest in Romania is officially open.

The Brukenthal Museum, in its present structure has the following branches:
The Brukenthal Palace with The Art Gallery and The Library
The Museum of Natural History with The Museum of the History of
Pharmaceutics and The Museum of Arms and Hunting Trophies
The History Museum

The Brukenthal Palace

Is situated in the West side of the Large Square
(Piaţa Mare) in Sibiu.
It is one of the largest civil building from
the XVIIIth century, in the style of Viennese baroque.
Its building is connected to the name of Samuel von Brukenthal,
governor of Transylvania, between the years 1777 - 1787
and a great lover of the letters and arts of those days.

The Art Gallery

It has its origins in the art collection set up by the baron Samuel
 von Brukenthal ever since the 60's of the XVIIIth century.
In 1790 the collection is inaugurated inside his residence from Sibiu,
where it still is.
It has 1090 paintings belonging to the Flemish, Dutch, German,
Italian, Austrian, French and Spanish painting schools,
a Flemish Breviary from the beginning of the XVIth century,
two sculptures from the Italian Renaissance, over 400 metal engravings,
objects forged by Transylvanian artisans, books, numismatics, geological and palaeontological samples.

The Brukenthal Library

The founder of the library is Samuel von Brukenthal.
According to his testamentary will, it is a public library since 1817.
The library counted at that time 15,972 volumes, acquired during
the baron's life, illustrating through their diversity and originality
the founder's spirit of Enlightenment.
Round about this nucleus, the nowadays Brukenthal Library has been set up through funds acquisitions.

Contributors
2007-03-26 19:47:04 created by petre
2007-03-29 17:43:15 change by petre