Barcelona Guide
Montjuïc
Museu d'Arqueològia de Catalunya
Address: Passeig de Santa Madrona
Opening time: Tues– Sat 9.30am–7pm, Sun & hols 10am–2.30pm
Price: €3
Telephone: 934 246 577
Website: www.mac.cat
Relics at the impressive Museu d'Arqueològia de Catalunya span the centuries from the Stone Age to the time of the Visigoths, with the Roman and Greek periods particularly well represented. The sections dealing with prehistoric, Stone and Bronze Age periods are the most disappointing, with any interest well hidden by the old-fashioned case-by-case presentation – though to be fair some exhibits are gradually being updated.
However, there's no such reservation about the displays in the central rotunda, which concentrate on sixth- and seventh-century BC finds from the Greek site at Empúries on the Costa Brava, some beautiful figures from the Carthaginian settlements in Ibiza, and ceramics from the Iberian era, including tablets bearing inscriptions in an indecipherable script. The highlights are many and varied, including a notable marble statue of Asclepius, Greek god of medicine, which dominates the hall.
The Second Punic War (218–201 BC) saw the Carthaginians expelled from Iberia by the Romans, who made their provincial capital at Tarragona (Tarraco), with a secondary outpost at Barcelona (Barcino). There's some fine Roman glassware and mosaic work on display, while an upper floor interprets life in Barcino itself through a collection of tombstones, statues, inscriptions and friezes found all over the city. Some of the stonework is remarkably vivid, depicting the faces of some of Barcino's inhabitants as clearly as the day they were carved.