TALE PAGES OF THE MOUNTAINOUS BANAT HISTORY
The Mountainous Banat Museum in Resita is the place where Banat’s history is presented as a tale told by its 7 collections, presented in the chronology of the seven rules under which the land was over the time. The 76,000 pieces of the museum come from private archaeological researches, from donations and purchases, or from random discoveries.
The museum building is located in Bârzavei Meadows, a district known by the locals as Govândari. The visitor who crosses its threshold can be surprised by the modern lines of architecture made by the Architect Șerban Antonescu, lines that draw some kind of cubes in the air, which can lead you to the idea of aspiration towards the heights, just like the multiple-storey forests of Mount Semenic.
The idea of establishment of the museum came from Reşiţa’s intellectuals, lovers of local history and culture, who in 1957 formed a “Committee for the establishment of the museum” at the Reşiţa plants, for the immediate rescue of the Banat’s industrial patrimony. Thus, as a result of the donations from the private collections, in the autumn of 1959 the Museum of the history of the Banat industry in Reşiţa was established, but officially certified in March 1962. After the administrative reorganisation of Romania in counties in 1968, the Reşiţa Museum became the Caraş-Severin County History Museum. The construction of the current edifice was completed in 1987, and the real life of the museum began in 1990, when the first exhibitions were arranged and opened to the public. In 1997, the museum has received the current name of the Mountainous Banat Museum of Resita. The permanent exhibitions of the museum opened in May 2000, after an interruption of a quarter of a century.
To visit the museum, tourists have to go through three large halls in spirals, which contain the 7 permanent collections exhibitions:
• the prehistoric collection;
• the collection of Dacian culture and civilisation;
• the collection of Roman culture and civilisation;
• the collection of medieval culture and civilization;
• Banat’s industrial history collection;
• Banat’s multicultural ethnography collection;
• The modern and contemporary Banat art collection.
As historian Dumitru Ţeicu, director of the museum, confesses, “all our permanent exhibitions contain only original pieces of the Banat heritage gathered or donated during the 50 years of activity” [Ţeicu D., 2012]
The visitors will be impressed having in front of their eyes:
- The Neolithic idols belonging to the Vinča Culture, pieces being discovered at Zorlenţu Mare;
- The Greek-Illyric helmet of the Iron Age, dating back to the 5th century BC, discovered at Berzovia;
- The wooden bucket which put in motion the stones of an Ilidia mill;
- The famous brick with the Latin inscription of the letter of a Roman soldier, dated back in the 4th century AD, being discovered at Gornea -Sichevita;
- The jewellery and adornment hoard (entwined bracelets, Tokay earrings, seal rings, etc.) from Macovişte;
- The numismatic collection of Roman and Medieval coins that circulated in Banat;
- The pottery workshop of the 12th century (medieval period), from Gornea-Sicheviţa, and reconstituted in natural size;
- The collection of folk costumes from Banat, with the 800 ethnographic pieces and the 300 three-dimensional pieces regarding the professions, traditions and customs of the Mountainous Banat ; both collections show the daily living of the Banat’s peasant;
- The collection of mine flowers, with 200 rhinestones gems from Mountainous Banat mines, representing in large part the donation of Constantin Gruiescu;
- The Stendl collection of 20 modern and contemporary art paintings donated by the famous plastic artist Ioan Stendl and his wife Teodora in 2007.
On the ground floor of the museum, tourists can always visit certain temporary exhibitions dedicated to different people of culture who were born or came afterwards to Banat, in the same time these displays are intended to some of the most important cultural events, such as “The Danubian Writings according to the Tartaria testimonies “. The Night of the Museums is a successful event of the Mountainous Banat Museum, organised annually in May, when children, young people or the elderly can spend a night of dreaming in a unique collection brought as a “surprise” for the visitors.