Praeneste. The rediscovery of the ancient city between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Praeneste. The Rediscovery of the Ancient City between the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries is the title of the exhibition to be inaugurated on February 11, 2023 in Palestrina, in the splendid setting of the recently reopened Forum Buildings Complex in Regina Margherita Square.

A long season of archaeological discoveries, protection, trade and dispersion of antiquities that began in the late eighteenth century with the researches of the Scotsman Gavin Hamilton until the discovery of the Sanctuary of Fortuna Primigenia, which came to light under the rubble of the bombed Historic Center in 1944: about two centuries of excavation campaigns, fortuitous discoveries, study and survey of ancient monuments that saw local personalities and institutions, public officials, associations, scholars and foreign academies as protagonists.

Photographs and unpublished documents from the photographic funds of the Foreign Institutes in Rome (American Academy of Rome, British School at Rome, Deutches Archeological Institut) and from some of the most important local and national archival sites constitute the foundations of an exhibition that will be enriched by the display of a selection of archaeological finds of Prenestine origin kindly granted by the Museo Nazionale Romano and other materials kept in the deposits of Palestrina and never exhibited to the public: prominent among them is the votive crown of Lucius Decumius, one of the oldest documents attesting to the cult of Fortuna Primigenia in Praeneste as early as the mid-Republican period and part of the ancient Kircheriana collection, a copy of which will be made by concession of the National Roman Museum thanks to a collaboration between the Municipality of Palestrina and the National Research Council.

In the itinerary of the exhibition, which winds its way through what was once the city's Episcopal Seminary Palace, incorporating the ancient Aula Absidata of the Forum, the civil basilica and the so-called. Nymphaeum of the Fishes (formerly Antro delle Sorti) also a series of video installations, with screenings of unpublished documentaries shot in the 1950s (The Stone Nile by S. Aurigemma and Palestrina by G.L. Rondi).
The exhibition is promoted by the City of Palestrina in collaboration with the Lazio Regional Museums Directorate of the Ministry of Culture, with the contribution of the Lazio Region and under the patronage of the American Academy of Rome and the British School at Rome.