MUSLI Museo di Antropologia Criminale Cesare Lombroso

The MUSLI Museo di Antropologia Criminale Cesare Lombroso is located at Via Pietro Giuria 15 in the San Salvario district of Turin, Piedmont, Italy, within the University of Turin's Museums of Human Sciences. It preserves the collection assembled by Cesare Lombroso (1835-1909), a physician and professor who founded criminal anthropology. Lombroso argued that criminal behaviour had biological origins visible in physical traits, an idea known as the born criminal, and he assembled skulls, anatomical casts, photographs and objects to support it. The museum opened in 1892 in the University and moved to its present premises, reopening in 2009.

The collection includes hundreds of skulls, death masks and wax models, as well as drawings, tattoos recorded on skin, objects made by prisoners and by patients of psychiatric hospitals, and items from Lombroso's studies of genius, folk beliefs and spiritualism. Lombroso's own study room has been reconstructed, and his skull and that of other individuals form part of the collection. The sources include the cases of the brigand Giuseppe Villella, whose skull influenced Lombroso's theory.

The curatorial approach is historical and critical rather than celebratory. The rooms present Lombroso's ideas in the context of 19th-century positivist science, and the displays make clear that his theories have been discredited and were later used to support discrimination. In 2012 the museum was the subject of public debate in Italy about the display of human remains, particularly claims from southern Italian communities regarding Villella's skull.

The museum is managed by the University of Turin, which has carried out conservation work on the specimens and the building. The fee is small, hours vary by day, and visitors should check museolombroso.unito.it before travelling. The material is sombre and best suited to adult visitors with an interest in the history of science.