MuSA — Museo dell'Osservatorio Astronomico di Capodimonte
Napoli (NA)
Hidden gemMuseums
The story
The first observatory of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, with its nineteenth-century brass telescopes, on a terrace overlooking the whole of Naples. On some evenings you really do watch the stars.
Access
By booking ONLY (beniculturali.inaf.it). Special evening openings 'Una notte al MuSA': € 7
More gems in Napoli
Sacred artCappella Sansevero (Cristo Velato)
Napoli (NA)
Beneath a veil of marble that still seems to breathe, Sanmartino's Cristo Velato rests in the chapel's half-light, and the whiteness of the stone deceives every eye.
Sacred artDuomo di Napoli
Napoli
Three times a year the city holds its breath as the blood of San Gennaro waits to liquefy, among Gothic naves and the gold of the chapel devoted to him.
Sacred artCappella del Tesoro di San Gennaro
Napoli
Behind a bronze gate lie silverware, gems and the jewel-studded mitre of the saint: a treasure heaped up over centuries by the devotion of Naples.
Sacred artChiesa del Gesù Nuovo
Napoli
The facade of pyramid-cut piperno stone hides symbols carved into the blocks, while inside the Baroque bursts out in marble and in the memory of the physician Giuseppe Moscati.
Sacred artChiostro di Santa Chiara
Napoli
A garden of pillars clad in yellow and blue majolica, where lemon pergolas and eighteenth-century scenes painted on the tiles keep the noise of the city at bay.
◆ Sacred artChiesa di Santa Luciella ai Librai (teschio con le orecchie)
Napoli
In the crypt of a small church rediscovered in the maze of the Librai rests the skull with ears, which the faithful believed could listen to their prayers.
More gems: Museums
MuseumsMANN — Museo Archeologico Nazionale
P.za Museo
One of the world's great archaeological museums: here the Toro Farnese, the mosaics of Pompeii and the Gabinetto Segreto tell the whole ancient Mediterranean in a single visit.
◆ MuseumsAntiquarium
Boscoreale
The museum that tells of daily life at the foot of Vesuvius before the eruption, among carbonised loaves, farm tools and finds handed back by the ash.
◆ MuseumsMuseo dell'Osservatorio Vesuviano
Ercolano
The oldest volcanological observatory in the world, willed by the Bourbons in 1841, with historic instruments and mineral collections, looking out over the slopes of Vesuvius.
◆ MuseumsMuseo Correale
Sorrento
In the family villa of the Correale counts: porcelain, inlaid wood and eighteenth-century views of Naples, and a garden that runs down to a belvedere over the sea.
MuseumsVilla Lysis — Jago Museum Capri
Capri
A 1905 Art Nouveau villa by the poet Fersen, dedicated to love and sorrow; since June 2026 it houses the Jago Museum Capri, with Jago's sculptures in the historic rooms high above the sea.
- ◆ Museums
Ospedale delle Bambole
Napoli
Behind a shop window in Palazzo Marigliano a craftsman mends glass eyes, porcelain arms and dolls' curls, in a workshop born more than a century ago.