Description of the attraction
The Olive Museum is located in one of the most important olive growing areas in the Mediterranean region - at the northern tip of the Italian region of Liguria, on the so-called Riviera di Ponente. Olive groves are visible everywhere - from the coast to the inland valleys and highlands. They occupy literally every corner, every piece of land suitable for cultivation. The museum itself occupies a beautiful Art Nouveau building, built in the 1920s, in the town of Imperia. It was once the headquarters of the Carly brothers corporation, and today the house is still owned by the family. The Museum of Olives exhibits an extensive collection of various objects that illustrate the history of olive cultivation for almost six thousand years. All of these items were collected by the Carly family.
The olive tree is one of the first trees that people began to cultivate for their own purposes. This happened about five thousand years ago in the eastern Mediterranean, and soon the production and sale of olive oil became one of the main sources of income for the entire region. The culture itself, thanks to the ancient Greeks, Phoenicians and Romans, also became the most important in the entire Mediterranean basin. You can get acquainted with the amazing history of the relationship between man and the olive tree in the first hall of the museum, where the remains of ancient wild olives, the remains of the oldest domesticated tree, antique letters dedicated to olive oil, ancient decanters and vessels are exhibited. In another room, you can see different types of olive trees, as well as images of ancient and modern groves and antique tools used to grow olives. A separate room is dedicated to the use of olive oil in the daily life of our ancestors: among the exhibits are wooden vessels for storing oil collected throughout the Mediterranean, glass lamps and lamps, perfume vases, tools with which oil was applied in the thermal baths, and furniture made from olive tree. Also in the museum you can see vessels in which oil was transported all over the world in antiquity, antique mosaics depicting olives, ancient Greek vases of various shapes, ceramics, various types of steel and cast iron presses used in Liguria for the production of oil, hand presses from the early 20th century and modern hydraulic systems. Tourists also do not pass by the reconstruction of an ancient Roman ship with amphorae for the transportation of oil - it is made in full size.
In addition to the exhibition halls, the museum has a storage facility and a specialized library dedicated to olives and olive oil. Next to the museum there is a modern olive oil factory and a small building that usually hosts conferences, meetings and other events. And in the garden, among the hundred-year-old olives, there are old mills - Spanish from the 17th century, Ligurian from the 19th century and another Spanish from the 19th century.
