GREAT MONASTERIES IN ITALY
Januari 27, 2023Planning Your Trip to Italy
Januari 27, 2023
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National Museum of Science and Technology “Leonardo da Vinci”
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With its twenty-eight sections, from information technology to engines to astronomy, some 40 000 square metres of displays, and a massive 15 000 pieces in its collection, the “Leonardo da Vinci” National Museum of Science and Technology in Milan is one of the most important technical and scientific museums in the world. The museum is made up of three separate buildings: the Monumental Building, which is a former Olivetan monastery whose construction dates back to the early sixteenth century; the Rail Transport Building and the Air&Sea Transport Building.
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The Monumental Building
The monumental building houses a number of important sections: the Computer Science section is devoted to the history of computation from a 17th-century abacus to a second-generation IBM computer; the Time Measurement section keeps a large collection of sand-glasses and watches; the section devoted to Acustics displays instruments for sound reproduction, from Edison’s phonograph to the most recent models. The Print and Graphical Arts section gathers wood presses inspired to Gutenberg’s, as well as iron presses and cylinder machines. A section also ilustrates the history of photography until moving pictures, while a very rich collection is devoted to telephones, radio and television. The Permanent Show of Recent Innovations (that displays new items on a six-month rota) keeps the most innovative technological products on the market, selected by a special scientific committee.
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The Leonardo Gallery
This is the most important section of the gallery, displaying a great number of wooden machines and instrument models based on Leonardo’s designs: war and flying machines, models of bridges and defensive works, the maquette of the ideal town, and every sort of scientific instruments. Some large-scale machines can even work.
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The Rail Transport Building
The Rail Transport Building is one of the most impressive areas in the Museum. It is the recreation of an Art Nouveau railway station housing a large fleet of steam locomotives and electric engines. The Museum’s collection includes memorabilia and recreations focusing on railways under construction, bridges, tunnel digging (a specific section is dedicated to this subject area), safety, a train’s instruments, rail telecommunications, etc.
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Air & Sea Transport Building
Created in the 1960s, this building is a particularly interesting part of the Museum in that it contains the schooner “EBE” and the bridge of the transatlantic liner “Conte Biancamano”. On the upper floor there are models reconstructing the history of aviation, as well as twelve original aeroplanes , and a substantial collection of aeronautical motors. The view looking down onto the “Ebe” is spectacular.
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