Description
The Palazzo dell'Accademia delle Scienze is the large 17th-century building on Via Accademia delle Scienze, in the center of Turin, which houses the Museo Egizio and the seat of the Academy of Sciences. The facade looks onto the street of the same name, while one side closes off one edge of Piazza Carignano.
Behind the facade are mummies, sarcophagi and statues of pharaohs: the Egyptian Museum has been based here since 1824, when the Egyptian collections of Bernardino Drovetti, bought by King Charles Felix, were installed. The building, however, was born for something quite different.
It was the Collegio dei Nobili, a school for the sons of the Piedmontese nobility. It was begun on June 24, 1679 and Michelangelo Garove finished it in 1687, partly changing the original design.
The original design was by the Jesuit Carlo Maurizio Vota, who envisioned three city blocks, as far as Piazza Castello, with underground passages: they were never built. For a long time the idea was attributed to Guarino Guarini, but today historians credit him with only a marginal role.
The plan was horseshoe-shaped, with a central block and two wings, on three floors above ground. For lack of money, the wing toward Piazza Carignano stopped at the first floor and stayed that way throughout the 18th century.
In 1787 Victor Amadeus III assigned it to the Royal Academy of Sciences, which has been based here ever since. In 1789 an observation tower was built on the south corner, used first as an astronomical and then as a meteorological observatory, and torn down during the Second World War.
In 1832 it was thought to gather here the Kingdom's collections of classical antiquities as well, which in 1940 were separated from the Egyptian ones. The portal was altered in the 19th century, for the opening of the Egyptian Museum, with a neoclassical balcony by Giuseppe Maria Talucchi.
From 1865 to April 2012 the building also housed the Galleria Sabauda, later moved to the Manica Nuova of the Royal Palace. The building has an area of 60,594 square meters.
Behind the facade are mummies, sarcophagi and statues of pharaohs: the Egyptian Museum has been based here since 1824, when the Egyptian collections of Bernardino Drovetti, bought by King Charles Felix, were installed. The building, however, was born for something quite different.
It was the Collegio dei Nobili, a school for the sons of the Piedmontese nobility. It was begun on June 24, 1679 and Michelangelo Garove finished it in 1687, partly changing the original design.
The original design was by the Jesuit Carlo Maurizio Vota, who envisioned three city blocks, as far as Piazza Castello, with underground passages: they were never built. For a long time the idea was attributed to Guarino Guarini, but today historians credit him with only a marginal role.
The plan was horseshoe-shaped, with a central block and two wings, on three floors above ground. For lack of money, the wing toward Piazza Carignano stopped at the first floor and stayed that way throughout the 18th century.
In 1787 Victor Amadeus III assigned it to the Royal Academy of Sciences, which has been based here ever since. In 1789 an observation tower was built on the south corner, used first as an astronomical and then as a meteorological observatory, and torn down during the Second World War.
In 1832 it was thought to gather here the Kingdom's collections of classical antiquities as well, which in 1940 were separated from the Egyptian ones. The portal was altered in the 19th century, for the opening of the Egyptian Museum, with a neoclassical balcony by Giuseppe Maria Talucchi.
From 1865 to April 2012 the building also housed the Galleria Sabauda, later moved to the Manica Nuova of the Royal Palace. The building has an area of 60,594 square meters.