Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (MANN)

The Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (MANN) occupies a 16th-century palace on Piazza Museo in the Centro Storico of Naples, in Italy's Campania region, and holds one of the most important collections of Greco-Roman antiquities in the world. The building began as a cavalry barracks, later housed the university and then became the royal museum of the Bourbon kings. Visitors climb a grand staircase hall and move through collections arranged over several floors. The ground floor is devoted largely to the Farnese collection of classical sculpture, including the monumental Farnese Hercules and the Farnese Bull, alongside the Egyptian collection. The mezzanine and upper floors display mosaics, frescoes, bronzes and everyday objects recovered from Pompeii, Herculaneum and other Vesuvian sites. The Alexander Mosaic, a vast floor mosaic from the House of the Faun in Pompeii showing Alexander the Great in battle, is the centrepiece of the mosaic rooms, and the Secret Cabinet gathers the erotic art of the Vesuvian cities. Because so much of the excavated material was moved here, the museum is often visited before or after Pompeii and Herculaneum to give context to those sites. A complete visit takes three to four hours, but a focused route through the Farnese sculptures, the Alexander Mosaic and the Pompeii frescoes can be done in about two hours. Weekday mornings at opening are generally the quietest; school groups and tour parties fill the main halls from late morning, and the free first Sunday of the month brings the heaviest crowds. The museum sits on Metro Line 1 (Museo) and Line 2 (Piazza Cavour), so it is easy to reach from the historic centre. High ceilings and good natural light reward photographers in the sculpture galleries and the central atrium. Some wings close on a rotating basis, so visitors with a particular exhibit in mind should check the museum website beforehand.