The Memory of Water: Giuli inaugurates the exhibition in Bolsena.

Today, the Minister of Culture, Alessandro Giuli, inaugurated the exhibition "The Memory of Water. New Archaeological Discoveries from the Gran Carro di Bolsena." Spread across two exhibition venues, the exhibition features a selection of artifacts discovered in the lake's waters thanks to research by the Underwater Archaeology Service of the Superintendency of Viterbo. These artifacts testify to the daily life of the populations living at the Gran Carro site, which once overlooked the lake's shores. The Minister first visited the exhibition at the Territorial Museum of Lake Bolsena, in the ancient Palazzo Monaldeschi della Cervara, which houses most of the materials from recent excavations. These artifacts are primarily part of the Villanovan culture, which preceded the formation of the great Etruscan cities of Vulci, Tarquinia, Cerveteri, Veii, and Orvieto. The Minister then proceeded to the second venue, the Church of Saints James and Christopher on Bisentina Island, which was returned to the community in 2024 after careful restoration. The exhibition is divided into four thematic sections—the world of women; the sacred; everyday life; and travel—with the aim of conveying the complexity and variety of these testimonies. Present were Mauro Rotelli, President of the Chamber of Deputies' Environment Committee; Andrea Di Sorte, Mayor of Bolsena; Fabrizio Magani, Director General of Archaeology, Fine Arts, and Landscape; Margherita Eichberg, Superintendent of the ABAP (Agricultural and Landscape Heritage Authority) for the Province of Viterbo and Southern Etruria; and Barbara Barbaro, archaeologist with the ABAP (Agricultural and Landscape Heritage Authority) Superintendency for the Province of Viterbo and Southern Etruria. "This is truly a chosen place," Minister Giuli declared, "an extraordinary place for many reasons. Lake Bolsena is the center of the world: not only because it is the largest volcanic lake in Europe, but because here lies the ancestral root of what would later become the Etruscan people, first Villanovan, then perhaps Tyrrhenian. There are many hypotheses, starting with the interpretation of the excavation material, the study of which will take a long time, and everything that may still emerge as research continues. Along with a few other places in Italy," the Minister continued, "Tuscia and Bolsena currently represent a model of reference, for what is happening here and for what a sort of sacred geography has offered us as a gift. We are faced with a history that goes back a long way, but whose discoveries project us forward. Here today we represent an ideal pact of friendship and solidarity," the Minister concluded, "between the ancient and the contemporary and between all of us who We are from Viterbo, inhabitants of Tuscia, Italians, Europeans, citizens of the world but proud to start from here, from Bolsena".