The 3 best dinosaur museums in Italy (so far)

Some dinosaur museums are so impressive and vast that you can plan a whole city trip around a visit. The Italian natural history museums are not.

Until recently, Italy was not known for its dinosaur finds. The limited dinosaur exhibits at the Italian natural history museums reflect this.

We recently visited the three best dinosaur museums in Italy to see what they had to offer. Although you should not plan a city trip around any of these museums, each museum is charming, unique, and worthy of a visit.

The best dinosaur museums in Italy

Recent visits to Milan, Bologna, and Venice included field trips to the local natural history museums. Why? Because that is what you do when you have a little dinosaur fan and a blog about all things dinosaur.

While they were only one element on our busy Italian itineraries, I am glad we included them – not just because it kept our LDA happy.

It’s difficult to decide which of these three is the best as each has its own unique aspects and charm. For ease, we’ll look at them in alphabetical order.

Geological Collection “Giovanni Capellini Museum”, Bologna

Industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie used his Diplodocus carnegiei as an example of the world’s shared history to foster dialogue between nations. As part of this “dinosaur diplomacy,” he gifted casts of Dippy to various nations. We’ve seen the casts in London, Berlin, Brussels, Paris and Vienna. You can also see Dippy in St Petersburg, Buenos Aires, Madrid, and Mexico City.

And in Bologna.

Dippy arrived in Bologna in 1909. Andrew Carnegie donated a copy to the Kingdom of Italy and King Vittorio Emanuele III. The King donated the 26-metre-long skeleton to the Museum of Geology and Palaeontology of the University of Bologna in recognition of the work of its founder, Giovanni Capellini.

Today, Dippy still has pride of place in the museum. And it’s why the Museo Giovanni Capellini is one of the best dinosaur museums in Italy.

Although they were established around the same time, the National Museum of Natural History in Paris is much larger with purpose-built areas to hold the huge dinosaur fossils. The Bolognese museum is cramped and full to the brim. Dippy stands in an area the size of our lounge and dining room and barely fits!

Dippy isn’t alone. Hiding under Dippy is a Tyrannosaurus skull with most of its teeth, and a cast of Tethyshadros insularis nicknamed Antonio, hangs on the wall. Antonio was discovered near Trieste in 1994. Scientists initially believed Antonio was a dwarf species.

In the middle of the room is a new exhibit with more information about the Diplodocus to celebrate 100 years of Dippy being in Bologna. This includes casts of an Archaeopteryx and Compsognathus, both discovered in the Altmühl Valley, and a Confuciusornis from China with preserved feathers.

The museum also has some impressive rocks, a mastodon, a glyptodon, and a cave bear.

Natural History Museum of Milan

What makes the Milan Natural History Museum one of the best dinosaur museums in Italy? It has the most dinosaur fossils. Apparently.

Gallery 7 displays an Allosaurus, a Plateosaurus, a Stegosaurus, a Dromaeosaurus, and a Tyrannosaurus. The latter is cast from Stan, one of the largest and most complete Tyrannosaurus skeletons ever found, which will be on display in the new museum in Abu Dhabi in 2025 (not one of the best dinosaur museums in Italy, but still one we’re looking forward to visiting). In another gallery is an Archaeopteryx. Other highlights include the snout of the largest known Spinosaurus, a “fossil dig” diorama, various small fossils dinosaur fans can touch, some ichnites, and a reconstruction of a Triceratops, created in the 1970s.

The museum is not only one of the best dinosaur museums in Italy, but it also has some of the best Italian dinosaur fossils on display.

“Ciro”, the Scipionyx samniticus, is a tiny bipedal predator which lived 113 MYA in Italy. An amateur palaeontologist found the fossil in 1981, and it is the only fossil in the world with fossilised internal organs (blood vessels, a piece of the trachea, food where the oesophagus and stomach were, and the intestines, including the lizards and fish it ate) as well as some muscles and bone cells. The fossil is a juvenile, perhaps three days old, and only 25 cm long.

This room also contains a cast of the fossils found Saltriovenator, the first dinosaur found in the Lombardy region, as well as a handy sketch to help you identify which bone is which. You can find a life-sized Saltriovenator out the front of the museum – great for photos.

Other exhibits worth seeing include a large Pliosaur, and a Placodont (prehistoric turtle) and Lariosaurus (a prehistoric aquatic reptile which lived like a seal), both of which were found in the Lombardy.

Upstairs you can find 12 rooms with 83 dioramas showing animals in their natural environment. Three rooms illustrate the diverse native animals, while others show the diversity of amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals, including the first diorama made in 1965 and dedicated to the anaconda.

Natural History Museum of Venice

The museum is housed in Fontego dei Turchi, a palazzo on the Grand Canal, built for the Pesaro family in the 13th century. The views from the second floor are great. Seriously. It has been the site of the Natural History Museum since it was established in 1923 – and it’s celebrating a century this year.

You’ll find the highlights on the second floor – at least from a dinosaur lover’s perspective.

In 1973, Giancarlo Ligabue organised an expedition to the southern Sahara Desert. He returned with the fossil of a giant crocodile – Sarcosuchus – and the only known fossil of an Ouranosaurus nigeriensis. He donated the fossil to Venice. This impressive Ouranosaurus specimen dominates the gallery.

The gallery also contains numerous other prehistoric finds ranging from 700 million years old to prehistoric humans, 40,000 years ago.

Other exhibits worth seeing:

• The Cetacean Gallery and Marine Aquarium illustrate the ecosystem of the Venetian coast.
• The Explorers from Venice Gallery showcases the expeditions of Giovanni Miani, especially his African explorations up the Nile between 1859 and 1860 and the 1,800 finds he donated to the city.
• The Room of Wonders contains an incredible variety of objects, plants, and animals, many of which were collected by private individuals in the 1700s.
• The Strategies of Life Gallery shows present-day and extinct inhabitants of water, land, and sky, from gigantic to microscopic, and focuses on unusual adaptations (like frogs that can “fly”).

Did I mention the museum is air-conditioned, budget-friendly, quiet, and has great views of the Grand Canal from the windows? This, and the dinosaurs, are why the Natural History Museum is one of the best dinosaur museums in Italy. 

Trieste?

In December 2021, a research team led by Federico Fanti, a professor at the University of Bologna, announced the discovery of the fossilised remains of a herd of 11 dinosaurs in a former limestone quarry in Villaggio del Pescatore, near Trieste. The dinosaurs, identified as Tethyshadros insularis, include the biggest and most complete skeleton ever found in the country.

Tethyshadros lived 80 YA and grew to be up to five metres long. Antonio (a cast of which can be seen in Bologna) was the first Tethyshadros, discovered in 1994. These more recent discoveries, the largest and most complete of which has been named Bruno, show Antonio is a juvenile who died with the herd.

Fossilised remains of fish, crocodiles, and pterosaurs have also been found at the site.

I heard that a new museum would be constructed to house the herd. I haven’t found any further information about this project, but you can find some of the fossils on display at the Civic Museum of Natural History in Trieste. We have not been to the museum yet, but it’s on our list of museums we want to see. Who knows, it might make this list of the best dinosaur museums in Italy…

You can also take a guided tour of the quarry at Villaggio del Pescatore in Italian, English, German, and Slovenian. The highlight is a cast of Antonio positioned where the original fossils were found. Check the website for more information.

Visit the best dinosaur museums in Italy

Italy’s dinosaur museums are steeped in tradition but lack the national prehistoric finds to make them as impressive as some of their foreign counterparts.

That does not mean they are not worth a visit! The natural history museums in Bologna, Milan, and Venice each have special and unique fossils to share, making them the best dinosaur museums in Italy.

Have you ever planned a city trip around a museum?

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