Mauro Faina
The majority of bronze objects were collected by count Mauro, who dedicated the last years of his life (from 1864 to 1868) to the collection. The objects came from excavations carried out by the count or from antiquarians in the areas of Orvieto, Chiusi, Perugia, Todi and Bolsena.
The first inventory of the collection (including a brief description of the items) was conducted in 1868. At that time there were more than 650 bronzes. The collection was held in Palazzo Faina in Perugia in the “bronze room”.
As confirmed in Mauro Faina’s writings, Memorie, ove si è scavato da Mauro Faina and Elenco di spese, Mauro was not interested where the objects he collected came from. He wrote mostly generic informations on his finds and often complained about his unfruitful excavations and about his high expenses incurred trying to increase the collection. Mauro’s bronze collection is very extensive and varied and contains many unique and rare pieces. Some of which are enable to know important examples of specific local productions. As expected, within the collection there are also fakes, pastiches and badly restored objects.
