Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres
Lugdunum in Lyon is important as a museum embedded in a Roman urban landscape with theatres. It presents an ancient city of Gaul not through a single object, but through the combination of museum, Fourvière hill, spectacle architecture and urban memory.
Lyon was a major centre of Gaul, and the museum links sculpture, inscriptions, pottery, coins, cult, trade and topography. It is a useful alternative to museums where objects are detached from a visible place.
Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres: Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum, entrée.
Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres: Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum, amphores à l'entrée.
Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres: Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum - Lieu des expositions temporaires - Un Empire, des peuples.Collection and Historical Context
Lugdunum was not an ordinary settlement but a major urban centre. show this scale and avoid transferring its evidence mechanically to every Gallic community.
Work with this museum requires three levels to be kept separate: display, catalogue and archaeological context. The display shows the object's form and scale, the catalogue clarifies date, material, inventory number and collection history, while context explains whether the object came from a house, cemetery, sanctuary, fort, workshop or urban monument.
A single famous exhibit is not always typical. Series are more reliable: several vessels of one type, a group of inscriptions, a funerary assemblage, repeated military fittings or several related sculptural solutions. Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres should therefore be read not only through its most famous objects, but through the links between galleries, collections and findspots.
Display and Main Materials
The theatres, museum models, inscriptions, sculpture, domestic pottery, water-supply material and objects explaining Lugdunum as an administrative and religious centre are especially important.
In the museum display it is important to look not only at individual masterpieces but at the neighbourhood of objects: sculpture, inscriptions, pottery, coins, architectural fragments and everyday items often explain one another better than an isolated photograph.
Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum - Exposition C'est canon ! L'art chez les Romains - Statue de Vénus Genitrix (Pouzzoles). Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum - Exposition C'est canon ! L'art chez les Romains - Statue d'Aphrodite accroupie. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Statue de Vénus Genitrix - Museo archeologico dei Campi Flegrei. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.Related Topics
- Museums of Antiquity
- Rheinisches Landesmuseum Trier
- Museum of Ancient Arles
- The Louvre and Antiquity
- Roman Archaeological Sources
Official Pages and Catalogues
Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum - Exposition Un Empire, des peuples - Relief de Maliku. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
The restored Circus Games Mosaic depicting a chariot race in quadrigas, 2nd century AD, from Lugdunum, Musée gallo-romain de Fourvière, Lyon (9191588535). Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
MBALyon2018 - Expo Claude - Statue Victoire. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Bas-relief d'Allât sous les traits d'Athéna Empire, Peuples. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Inscription honoring Tib. Antistius Marcianus (Lyon, Mus Gall-Rom AD23). Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Lyon 5e - Musée Lugdunum - Exposition C'est canon ! L'art chez les Romains - Statuette de génisse (Bronze.1157) 01. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Coin Elagabalus MBA Lyon. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Coin Julia Domna MBA Lyon. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Coin Trajan MBA Lyon. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Bronze sestertius Antoninus MBA Lyon. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Bronze sestertius Hadrianus MBA Lyon. Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.
Bronze black slave, 2nd–3rd c. AD (27683447424). Object from the collection: Lugdunum Museum and Roman Theatres.Interested in Ancient Rome beyond reading? Join Legio X Fretensis or explore our reenactment directions.
