National Archaeological Museum of Tarragona

The Tarragona National Archaeological Museum is a public center for the conservation and dissemination of material testimonies that illustrate the historical and monumental importance of the ancient Roman city of Tarraco, capital of one of the most extensive provinces of the Roman Empire, and daily life in The Iberian Peninsula during the Ancient Age. The collections constitute an obligatory reference for the study of the Roman Tarragona.

Created in 1848 from collections of artifacts found in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, the MNAT is the oldest archaeological museum in Catalonia. Most part of its collection have been recovered in the last 150 years, as a result of the excavations carried out in the Paleocristian Necropolis and in the Forum of the Colony, or thanks to the casual findings generated by the great urban expansion of Tarragona. After being housed for more than a hundred years in an old convent of Santo Domingo in the Fontain Square, in 1960 the museum has been moved to the building currently occupied, built over a section of the Roman wall preserved today to the basement.

The Tarragona National Archaeological Museum also manages other centers such as the Paleocristian Necropolis, the Roman Theater, the Roman villa of Els Munts, the Roman villa of Centcelles, and the monuments of the Arc de Barà and the Tower of the Scipios.

Permanent exhibition

The museum has four floors destined to exhibit its collections. The material exhibited includes numerous architectural elements, mosaics, ceramics, domestic and military tools, amphoras, furniture, dresses, funerary objects and coins. Among the most important pieces are the famous floor mosaic of the Medusa, the best mosaic found in Tarraco, the Mosaic of the Fishes, the the Lions Sarcophagus and the official portrait of the Emperor Lucius Verus.