Top 5 Natural History Museums in Province of Padua, Veneto

Villa Beatrice Naturalistic Museum Villa Beatrice is located on the summit of Mount Gemola in a panoramic position. The monument is called a saint, Beatrice, who lived here from 1221 and 1226. In this area stood, in fact, in place of an ancient monastery villa / Benedictine monastery, named after St. John the Baptist, previously inhabited by hermits, as so many others scattered throughout the Middle Ages in the solitude of the Hills. Beatrice descended by the illustrious house of Este who, before moving to Ferrara, had lordship of Este and the Padua area. In 1576, the nuns of the monastery of Gemola were transferred to Padua and the remains of Beatrice transferred to the Church of St. Sophia. The monastery was then abandoned and documented information on the history of the whole very few. In 1657, the Venetian merchant Francesco Ruberto who turned it into a villa giving it its current appearance owns the property. The construction of the barn dates back to the 800. Restored in the early '80s was intended to house in some places a Nature Museum of the Hills Hills. The main building retains outside a monastic severity with economical use of decorative elements. Inside, the building is structured with the plan of Venetian patrician buildings with central hall and side rooms open to this. The central hall has double height and refined by a Murano glass chandelier, a balustrade and a beautiful seventeenth-century wooden ceiling geometric compartments. Also significant is the noble oratory adjoining the villa dedicated to St. John the Baptist. The museum exhibition includes sections devoted to insects, reptiles, amphibians, birds and flora of the Euganean Hills