useum Alaoui / Bardo National Museum

Archaeological Monuments and RuinsSalto de línea

Museum Alaoui / Bardo National Museum

The palace built by M'Hammed Bey in a residential area of Tunis between 1776 and 1825 to serve as the beys' residence was remodelled and inaugurated as the Museum Alaoui in 1888, and in 1952 it was renamed the Bardo National Museum.

Of the eighty-nine photographs of the museum included in this catalogue, nineteen are views of its galleries and their decorative tiles and images of the first exhibition design.

All date from between 1888 and 1892, and many were taken by J. Garrigues, a French photographer with a studio in Tunis. The rest give us an idea of the vast treasures it houses: Roman and Punic sculptures, Roman mosaics, Palaeo-Christian tombstones, Punic terracottas and stelae constitute a selection of the pieces owned by one of the most important museums in the Mediterranean Basin.

All of them were shown at the 1892 Exhibition in five frames dedicated to the Museum Alaoui in the first series, in Gallery III.