Septem Mària Museum

❝The 19th century water-drainage pump of Amolara today sits on top of one of the oldest Etruscan necropolises of the Po. Here, the Septem Mària museum recounts the water-based civilization of the Po through "liquid memories" exhibitions. From ancient to industrial techniques and imaginaries, the museum traces a centuries-old history of cohabitation with the great Po River – a coexistence that was not always easy.❞

The Septem Mària museum ("Seven Seas") was established in 1998 inside the disused water-drainage system of Amolara, easily recognizable from afar thanks to its characteristic chimney measuring about 50 metres in height. The hydraulic artefact, a neoclassical building designed by the engineer Cesare De Lotto in 1853, was closed in the early 1990s in order to use it as an exhibition space with a hostel next door.
The name Septem Mària, which harks back to the Roman navigation through inland waters along the legendary "Seven Seas", was first used by Pliny the Elder who, in the 1st century AD, describes this area of the Polesine as being characterized by numerous navigable waterways and by several coastal lagoons communicating with the sea. An ideal context for the sorting of traffic and trade from all over the Mediterranean and beyond. Pliny can also take credit for the lively portrait of the inhabitants of these amphibious lands, who used to tie boats to their homes just like they did with horses in other places.
The museum illustrates the history and evolution of "liquid heritage" in the Delta area and the difficult relationship with water of the area's inhabitants, due to their problematic cohabitation with the insanitary swamps present in most of the Polesine area. Almost all the lands of the Po Delta are, in fact, at a lower level than that of the sea: the balance with marine waters today is constantly monitored and regulated by water-drainage plants like the one in Amolara.
In the first room, the museum houses a reproduction of an engraving by Filippo Cluverio, created in 1624, which offers a valuable visual description of the Septem Mària. Afterwards there is the land reclamation workshop, which displays old tools that were used in the drainage and recovery of the surrounding area. The heart of the collections can be found in the engine room of the old water pump, where it is possible to admire two centrifugal pumps that are in excellent condition.
The museum itinerary allows the observation of the in-flow channel of the “mandracchio” (a small sheltered harbour reserved for the mooring of small boats) and of the water-drainage machines, continuing with an interesting series of panels that illustrate the history of land reclamation in the Polesine area. Proceeding with the exhibition itinerary we find the model of an old pump with paddle-board wheels, the reproduction of the legendary Tavola Peutingeriana - an evocative ante litteram "road map" of the ancient world, and a valuable map of the Polesine dated 1713. The third and final area houses a collection of hydraulic pumps and old artefacts used in the reclamation and recovery operations of the marshy areas.