"Aurelian Sacerdoțeanu" History Museum

The History Museum in Râmnicu Vâlcea is one of the most important heritage institutions in northern Oltenia, operating as a section of the "Aurelian Sacerdoțeanu" County Museum — named after the great Vâlcea historian. The museum is housed in a building emblematic of the city, the former "School with a Clock", built in the late 19th century in a neoclassical style and listed among the architectural monuments. The institution took shape around 1949–1950, based on collections taken over from the "Lahovari" High School. The permanent exhibition, reorganised between 2003 and 2008, traces the evolution of human communities in the Vâlcea region, from the Palaeolithic to the Roman era, with reconstructions of archaeological sites and of a Roman fort. A central place is given to the evidence of Buridava — the important Dacian and later Roman settlement in the area of today's Stolniceni and Ocnița districts, one of the largest Dacian fortifications south of the Carpathians, mentioned on the Roman map Tabula Peutingeriana. The collections also include the treasure found at Pădurețu, numismatic pieces, weapons from the period of wars and revolutions, documents and portraits of local personalities. The museum's most valuable piece is a bronze death mask, discovered in 1978 at the Dacian Buridava site — unique in Europe. For two decades, the mask was displayed in Nicolae Ceaușescu's villa, and its image now appears on the museum's frontispiece, having become a symbol of the institution. Besides its central seat, the County Museum also coordinates other museum sites in the city and county, including the "Simian House" Art Museum, the "Anton Pann" Memorial House and the Vâlcea Village Museum at Bujoreni. The History Museum is worth visiting for the variety of its collections, which cover the entire historical evolution of Vâlcea County, and for the monument building that houses it, a landmark of Râmnicu Vâlcea.