The Museum of San Gennaro

The newest museum in Naples has to do with one of the oldest manifestations of religious faith in the city, and certainly the most fascinating. Elsewhere in the Around Naples encylopedia there is material dealing with the person of San Gennaro (St. Jannuarius). This brief item you are reading here, however, is dedicated to the recently inaugurated Museum of the Treasures of San Gennaro, where a great number of gifts are on display that have been donated ex voto to the saint--that is, to honor a vow made per grazie ricevute--for grace received.

One should note, at the outset, that there was a great deal of resistance to having a museum of this kind in Naples. Neapolitans regularly and unselfconsciously talk to their saints--their personal onomastic saints, of course, but especially to San Gennaro, the patron saint of the city, itself. Not all of the talk is about matters of the spirit, either, or even to invoke intercession against illness or calamity. Some of it is downright pecuniary and folksy: ("Come on, Gennà, would it kill you just this once to let these few numbers come up in the lottery, tomorrow?). Thus, there is a "cult of San Gennaro," people whose faith is so deep and whose dedication so unwavering that a museum of ex voto items seemed irreverent and out of place. The very idea of having tourists lollygagging by to look at these items out of abstract cultural interest...well, it didn't seem right.

However that may be, the museum has been open since February of this year. It took eight years to plan and seven months to set up. It is on the premises of the Duomo, the Naples Cathedral. The entrance is just to the right of the main entrance to the cathedral at the end of the portico walkway of the adjacent building. The premises of the museum occupy two floors. (The museum is not to be confused with the Chapel of the Treasure of San Gennaro consecrated in 1646 and within the Cathedral, itself.)