Antiquarium (Munich Residenz)
Antiquarium
Interesting facts
- To stock the hall, Albrecht V sent Jacopo Strada to Venice, where in 1568 he bought Andrea Loredan's famed collection after a lawsuit and intervention by the Venetian government.
- The Loredan purchase alone brought 91 portrait heads, 43 statues and torsos, 33 reliefs, about 120 small bronzes and roughly 2,500 Greek and Roman coins.
- The painters of the 102 town views included Hans Donauer the Elder, Alessandro Scalzi, known as Padovano, and Antonio Viviani.
- The continuous barrel vault is lit by 17 pairs of windows, whose recesses carry much of the painted survey of the duchy.
- The upper floor originally held the ducal library of Albrecht V, the collection that later grew into the Bavarian State Library.
- Post-war reconstruction, including closing the bomb gap in the vault, was directed by the architect Otto Meitinger.
- The hall is still used for Bavarian state receptions and concerts, continuing the banqueting role it was given around 1600.
Why it is worth it
The Antiquarium in the Munich Residenz is a single barrel-vaulted hall 66 metres long, and it is often called the largest and most lavish Renaissance interior north of the Alps. It was built between 1568 and 1571 for Duke Albrecht V of Bavaria, a passionate collector who wanted a worthy setting for his collection of ancient sculpture. The plan was developed by the court architect Wilhelm Egckl on ideas of the Mantuan antiquarian and art dealer Jacopo Strada: a two-storey building with the marble busts and statues on the ground floor and the ducal library above — hence the name, a house for antiquities.
The hall did not keep that purpose for long. The library moved out in 1581, and between the 1580s and 1600 Duke Wilhelm V and his son Maximilian I turned the Antiquarium into a festive banqueting hall. The painter and designer Friedrich Sustris directed the transformation, and the result is a room in which almost every surface is ornamented. Sixteen large paintings from the workshop of Peter Candid on the vault present allegories of virtue and fame, while grotesques in the classical manner — slender tendrils, masks, fantastic creatures — fill the spaces between them.
The most charming detail is in the lunettes and window recesses: 102 small views of Bavarian towns, market villages and palaces, a painted survey of the duchy as it looked around 1600. Below them stand the busts on their pedestals, among them pieces from Albrecht V's original collection alongside later acquisitions of the 17th and 18th centuries. A bomb struck the vault in the Second World War and damp later destroyed much of the ceiling painting; the hall seen today is the result of careful post-war restoration, and it is visited as part of the Residenz Museum.
Getting there
The Antiquarium is inside the Munich Residenz, the former palace of the Bavarian rulers in the centre of Munich, about 0.4 km from the heart of the old town. Munich Airport (MUC) is about 28 km away.
Plan your visit
We have no confirmed visit data yet. Once it is confirmed, this block also carries the date it was checked.
Nearby places
- Asam Church 0.9 km · church
- Müllersches Volksbad 1.2 km · public-bath
On these lists
From the encyclopaedia
The Antiquarium was built from 1568 to house the ducal Collection of Classical Antiquities and Library as an extension of the Munich Residenz and was converted into a ballroom soon after. It is one of the most important surviving Renaissance collection buildings.
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