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Bardo National Museum Description
Four km/2.5mi west of Tunis is the suburb of Le Bardo, famed for the Bardo National Museum (Musée National du Bardo), which has the world's largest collection of Roman mosaics and ranks with the Egyptian Museum in Cairo as one of the two great museums of North Africa. (Other Tunisian museums with fine mosaics are those of Sousse, El Djem and Sfax:)

Access

The museum is easily reached from the city center by public transport (bus No. 3 from the corner of Avenue Habib Bourguiba and Rue de Rome or No. 4 from Jardin Habib Thameur), by taxi or by car. For those traveling by car the route is as follows: From Place Bab Souika, at the north end of the Medina, take Rue Bab Saadoun, which runs northwest to the roundabout at Bab Saadoun
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Hobbies & Activities category: Archeological exhibit, museum;  Islamic site or artifact collection;  Major world-scale museum;  Prehistoric site or exhibit
Bardo National Museum Highlights

Islamic Museum

The Museum of Islamic Art at Reqqada is still in course of development. Part of the Bardo collection has been and is being transferred there, and it is not therefore possible to say precisely what
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First Floor

A pretty little inner courtyard gives access to other rooms. In a recess at the entrance are two thrones presented to the Bey by Napoleon III. In a series of small rooms opening off the courtyard
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Ground Floor

The Museum of Islamic Art, which is entered from Corridor D in the main Bardo National Museum, is housed in the Hussein Palace (1824-35), which is linked with the main building. In a room in the
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Collection

The Museum gives a comprehensive view of the prehistoric, Phoenician, Roman, Christian and Arab past of Tunisia. The collection is arranged chronologically and, within particular periods, by
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First Floor

From Room 5 a staircase (with Early Christian mosaics from Tabarka on the walls) leads to the upper floor.

Room 16

Punic jewelry and ornaments (finely restored) of the seventh-third centuries B.C. Some of the items came from overseas.

Acholla Room

Mosaics from Acholla (present-day Ras Bou Tria, 40km/25mi north of Sfax, near Djebeniana). Dating from the second century, they are among the earliest mosaics found in Tunisia. Particularly fine is
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Althiburos Room

Room 13 takes its name from the large third century mosaic from Althiburos (Medeina, near Le Kef). This depicts over 20 different types of ancient ships sailing in a sea teeming with fish, each
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Carthage Room

Room 9 (Carthage Room)

In this colonnaded room with a ceiling decorated in Italian style, originally the Great Hall of the palace, are displayed finds from Roman Carthage. The best general view of
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Dougga Room

Room 11 (Dougga Room)

Most of the exhibits in this room come from Dougga (third and fourth century). The mosaic of the Cyclopes (Brontes, Steropes and Pyracmon) forging thunderbolts comes from the
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El Djem Room

Room 12 (El Djem Room)

This room is mainly devoted to material from El Djem (ancient Thysdrus). The mosaics mostly date from the third century. Note particularly the "Triumph of Bacchus", a
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Fresco Room

Rooms 34 and 35

In spite of its name the Fresco Room mainly displays mosaics, including scenes in the circus (Dougga) and hunting scenes (El Djem), as well as remains of frescoes from Gightis.

Kourba

Room 29

The mosaics on the walls of the staircase are from Kourba (second century). The upper gallery of the Great Hall is lined with cases displaying small items from Roman tombs (terracotta
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Mausoleum room

Room 24, the Room of the Mausoleum, contains a reconstruction of a second century mausoleum from Carthage, all four sides of which are covered with fine bas-reliefs. Also in this room are mosaics
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Mosaics

Room 23

The Room of the Marine Mosaics, are a variety of mosaics, mainly from Carthage, Gightis, El Djem and Oudna.

Corridor F

Mosaics from Carthage, Thuburbo Majus and El Djem.

Room 25

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Odysseus Room

Room 27 is called the Odysseus Room, after a mosaic from Dougga of which four fragments have been preserved; one of them shows Odysseus tied to the mast as he listens to the Sirens (third century)
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Oudna Room

Room 14, the former dining room of the palace, which also has a painted ceiling in Italian style, contains mosaics of the second and third centuries from Oudna (ancient Uthina), 25km/15mi southwest
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Roman ship discovery

Rooms 17-22 display material recovered from the Roman ship which sank off the coast at Mahdia in 81 B.C. and was discovered by sponge-divers in 1906 lying at a depth of 39m/128ft. It was carrying a
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Sousse Room

Room 10 (Sousse Room)

Material from Sousse (ancient Hadrumetum) is displayed in the former banqueting hall of the palace, which has a domed ceiling with delicate ornament by Tunisian craftsmen. On
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Virgil Room

Room 15 (Virgil Room)

A short flight of steps at the lower end of the Great Hall leads into the Virgil Room. This was originally the center of the harem, the Bey's private apartments, with the
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Ground floor

Room 1

Entrance; information; sale of guides and casts of statues and masks. Plaster model of Roman Gightis.

Corridor A

Finds from a tophet at Sousse (third-second century B.C.). Two of the
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Bronze armor

Rooms 3 and 4

Bronze armor with a head of Minerva, originally from Campania, which was found in a cedarwood coffin at Ksour Essaf. Punic grave goods (in cases). Of particular interest are the
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Bulla Regia Room

Room 6

(Bulla Regia Room)

The mosaics in this room date from the heyday of Bulla Regia in the A.D. second and third centuries. Opposite the entrance hangs the famous mosaic of Perseus and
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Early Christian Rooms

Early Christian Rooms

The centerpiece of the Early Christian Rooms (Salles Paléo-Chrétiennes) is a mosaic-decorated immersion font in the shape of a Greek cross (sixth century) found in a church
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Neo-Punic collection

Corridor B

Neo-Punic funerary stelae and clay statuettes of divinities (first century B.C.). The stelae, in the form of obelisks, have Punic inscriptions, like- Clay mask nesses of deities (Tanit
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Neo-Punic sarcophagi

Corridor D

Neo-Punic funerary stelae and richly decorated sarcophagi of the second and third centuries. Note particularly a sarcophagus at the near end of the corridor with symbols representing
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Thuburbo Majus Room

Room 8 (Thuburbo Majus Room)

The mosaics and sculpture in this room come from private houses, public buildings and a temple (later converted into a church) in Thuburbo Majus (third and fourth
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Tophet of Carthage

Room 2

Finds from the Tophet of Carthage, where children were sacrificed to Baal-Ammon. Urns, cippi and votive stelae of the sixth-second centuries B.C., showing the development of forms over the
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History

The site, lying in fertile country immediately outside the gates of the capital, was occupied in the 13th century by a Hafsid palace. The origin of the name Bardo is disputed. Some hold that it is
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Address
Bardo National Museum
2000 Le Bardo
Tunisia
Hours
November 1 to April 30
MonTueWedThuFriSatSun
Open9:309:309:309:309:309:309:30
Closed16:3016:3016:3016:3016:3016:3016:30
May 1 to October 31
MonTueWedThuFriSatSun
Open9:009:009:009:009:009:009:00
Closed17:0017:0017:0017:0017:0017:0017:00
Facilities
Gift shop
Restaurant or food service
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