Tarquinia National Museum site features

The museum occupies all three floors of Palazzo Vitelleschi, on piazza Cavour in the historic centre of Tarquinia, and the display runs in chronological order as you climb.

The ground floor holds the stone: sarcophagi and other carved pieces arranged in sequence, belonging to the great Tarquinian families of the late Classical and Hellenistic periods and datable from the middle of the 4th century B.C. The best of them are gathered in the first room, several cut from Greek marble, and they include the sarcophagi of the Magnate, the Obeso and Laris Pulenas.

The first floor is the pottery and the grave goods, again chronological, beginning with the oldest material from the Villanovan period of the 9th and 8th centuries B.C. Then come the Orientalizing imports from Phoenicia and Egypt -- among them the Bocchoris vase, of the Egyptian 24th dynasty -- followed by Greek vases, above all from Corinth, imported in quantity from the end of the 7th to the 6th century B.C., and the Etrusco-Corinthian ware the Etruscans produced in imitation of them. Bucchero, the characteristic Etruscan black ware made as a cheap substitute for bronze vessels, sits alongside. After that come the Attic imports in black-figure and red-figure technique. In a case in the ballroom are Etruscan bronze coins, cast and struck, together with late imperial gold coins found in the excavations of the Roman colony of Gravisca, Tarquinia's ancient harbour, deduced in 181 B.C., and gold jewellery made by granulation. The medagliere also absorbed the coin hoard discovered in 1964 near the great temple. The floor ends with votive offerings.

The upper floor is a square porch with a view over the city and the countryside, and it holds the museum's most famous possessions: restored paintings from four tombs of the Monterozzi necropolis -- the Tomb of the Triclinium, the Tomb of the Bigas, the Tomb of the Olympic Games and the Tomb of the Ship -- detached in the 1950s for conservation and remounted on frames reconstructing the burial chambers.

Also on display is the high relief known as the Cavalli Alati, a pair of winged horses that once decorated the Ara della Regina, the Etruscan temple of Tarquinia dating to the 4th century B.C. It was found in 1938 and has been exhibited here since the autumn of that year.

The museum runs chronologically up three floors of a 15th-century palace, and the building is as much a part of the visit as the collection.

• The Cavalli Alati -- a high relief of winged horses from the Ara della Regina, found in 1938 and on show since that autumn.
• The detached tomb paintings -- from the Tombs of the Triclinium, the Bigas, the Olympic Games and the Ship, remounted on frames that rebuild the burial chambers.
• The sarcophagus of Laris Pulenas -- among the finest of the stone monuments of the leading Tarquinian families, with those of the Magnate and the Obeso.
• The Bocchoris vase -- an import of the Egyptian 24th dynasty, among the Orientalizing material.
• The bucchero -- the characteristic Etruscan black ware, made as an economical version of bronze vessels.
• The medagliere -- Etruscan bronze coinage, cast and struck, plus the hoard found in 1964 near the great temple.
• The Gravisca gold -- late imperial gold coins from the Roman colony at Tarquinia's ancient harbour, deduced in 181 B.C.
• Granulated gold jewellery -- worked in the Etruscan granulation technique.
• Palazzo Vitelleschi itself -- built 1436-1439, its facade a mixture of Gothic and Renaissance.
• The second-floor porch -- a square loggia with views over Tarquinia and the countryside.