SHORT GUIDE TO THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM OF THESSALONIKE

Περιγραφή

The Archaeological Museum of Thessalonike, the work of the architect Patroklos Karantinos, was inaugurated on 27 October 1962, and the display in all the galleries was completed in 1971. It includes sculptures, the prehistoric collection, miniature works of art from the Archaic and Classical periods, and the brilliant group of finds from the tombs at Derveni, which was first presented to the public in 1962 on the day of the inauguration. A few years later, in 1978, the dazzling finds from Vergina necessitated the first change to the display: objects from the royal tombs were exhibited in the area occupied by the prehistoric collection and miniature art, as part of the exhibition ‘Treasures of Ancient Macedonia’. The Vergina treasures and other valuable finds from the 1970s made it necessary to extend the museum building: the New Wing was inaugurated in July 1980 with the exhibition ‘Alexander the Great’. The excavation of the cemetery at Sindos, so rich in gold, began in this same year and the exhibition of objects from Sindos was presented to the public in October 1982. There followed the re-exhibition of the finds from Vergina and Derveni in 1984 and an exhibition on ancient Thessalonike in 1985, and in 1989 the new finds from ancient and Classical times were displayed in the ground floor of the New Wing. No other museum in Greece has experienced the rapid increase in objects for display faced by the Archaeological Museum of Thessalonike in the last twenty years; the result has been frequent changes and additions to the original display of 1971, and the partial violation of the arrangement by successive periods on which the exhibition was organized. All that survives of the original display of 1971 is the sculpture exhibition which has been slightly modified. Visitors to the museum may visit individual exhibitions (Vergina, Thessalonike, Sindos), depending on the amount of time at their disposal. If they wish to form a picture of the chronological evolution of c