MAEP: Objectives of the Project
The project objective was to create a museum for the underground necropolis of San Cerbone, located in the Gulf of Baratti Tuscany (ITALY). The history of the Etruscans and their propitiatory rites have formed the basis of the project, because the ceremony of foundation of the Etruscan city is here reproduced in its entirety. The site and its history were the starting points for a project that will not exalt himself, but around the Etruscan tombs, which are the real wealth of Baratti. The idea is based on the museum's underground Etruscan design principle and the desire to create a new complex of low environmental impact.
Progress, Methodologies and tools used for the Project
The Etruscans built their cities following a few keywords: underground, orthogonality, excavation, city. They founded their new city along the lines of the cardinal axes north-south east-west and enclosed within massive walls that had a defensive and constituted a sacred boundary that could not be exceeded. The graves were actually underground, dug in the ground or in the hills. All corresponded to their division of the sky, the north-south axis, the walls, the boundary sacred, because everything was due to the gods of which they were afraid and who feared retaliation. The project follows step by step the foundation ritual of the Etruscan city: 1-trace the walls of the city sacred to the gods and the access doors, 2-track the city's main north-south, 3-locate a portion of land next to the walls called pomerium, it was sacred and could not be cultivated they built it. The museum is proposed as a new town near the city of the dead, that in reality for the Etruscans had the eternal city because they believed in life after death.
Results
Once passed the entrance consists of a gap in the wall, like a gateway to the city museum, the visitor finds himself in a sort of triangular-shaped terrace, bounded north-axis south and the border wall. From this terrace you can admire the entire lower part of the Necropolis from afar and see the other tombs of monumental character. By then a ramp down to approximately 2.50 m (similar to the Etruscan dromos), reaches the front of the entrance to the museum, flanked by a court that acts as an anti-entry in which it changes the perception of space because if the previous terrace he could have a global view of the necropolis, now the only thing you will see the wall and the sky. The entrance to the museum wants to deliberately invoke the entrance to the tombs of the Necropolis of the Caves in Populonia and those of many other Necropolis found in Etruria, suggesting the theme of the excavation and the descent to a subterranean environment. Beyond the entry threshold, the first space that offers the visitor has an area of services, ie ticketing, bookshop, toilets, cloakrooms and a small cafeteria. The visitor can now decide whether to visit the museum and then the park or if you only visit the tombs of the Necropolis and then go over the ramp, go to the terrace and along the north-south path to reach the Mound of Floats not travel through the museum halls. Continuing in the underground path, the visitor is faced with a long corridor, flanked on the left by a few small niches that receive light from the opening located between the outer wall and two on the right side alternately, from the outputs to the outside and the three museum rooms.