The Palace of Culture () is an edifice located in

Iași Iași ( , , ; also known by other #Etymology and names, alternative names), also referred to mostly historically as Jassy ( , ), is the Cities in Romania, third largest city in Romania and the seat of Iași County. Located in the historical ...

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

. The building served as the Administrative and Justice Palace until 1955, when its designation and use was changed, and assigned to the four museums nowadays united under the name of Moldavia National Museum Complex. Also, the building houses the Cultural Heritage Conservation-Restoration Centre, and hosts various exhibitions and other events. The Palace of Culture is listed in the National Register of Historic Monuments.

History

Located in the perimeter of the medieval Princely Court of

Moldavia Moldavia (, or ; in Romanian Cyrillic alphabet, Romanian Cyrillic: or ) is a historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester River. An initially in ...

(from 1434), the construction was conceived as a rebuilding and expansion project of the former Princely Palace of Moldavia, dated to the time of Prince Alexandru Moruzi (1803–1806, architect Johan Freywald), and renovated by Prince Mihail Sturdza (1841–1843, architect Nicolae Singurov), from which it preserved the foundations and first two floors. It was from this latter building that the Palace inherited the legend of the 365 rooms, as many as the days within one year. The Romanian architect ''I.D. Berindei'' was assigned to plan and conduct the rebuilding process. Unlike the old palace, built in a

neoclassical style Neoclassicism, also spelled Neo-classicism, emerged as a Western cultural movement in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that drew inspiration from the art and culture of classical antiquity. Neoclassici ...

, Berindei chose to design it in a flamboyant

Neo-Gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half of the 19th century ...

style. Started in 1906–1907, the reconstruction works were halted during

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, due to the limitation of resources, but the unfinished building sheltered Romanian and Russian troops, and different public institutions and military hospitals. The monument was finally completed on 11 October 1925, and officially inaugurated one year later, by King

Ferdinand I of Romania Ferdinand I (Ferdinand Viktor Albert Meinrad; 24 August 1865 – 20 July 1927), nicknamed ''Întregitorul'' ("the Unifier"), was King of Romania from 10 October 1914 until his death in 1927. Ferdinand was the second son of Leopold, Prince of Hoh ...

. The building housed the County Law Court and other public institutions until 1955, when it received an exclusive cultural function. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, the Palace sheltered German troops, and then, Soviet troops. In 1975–1977, the wood bridging from the last floor was replaced with a cement one, fixed with steel netting. The new bridging sustained the monument during the earthquake of 1977, but the bridging from the first floor, the walls, the ornaments and the relief works were affected. A large-scale restoration project, considered one of the most complex in Romania since 1990, began in 2008. The main works were completed in April 2016. Between 1955 and 2010, the Palace of Culture also hosted the main branch of the Iași County Library.

Architecture

The Palace has 298 large rooms with a total area of , 92 windows in the front part of the building and another 36 inside the building. Decoratively, the central hall shows a figurative mosaic including various representations of a gothic bestiary, concentrically arranged: two-headed eagles, dragons, griffons, lions. The hall is superposed by a glass ceiling room, where initially a greenhouse was arranged. In spite of its archaic-looking design, the Palace was designed so to integrate modern materials and technologies. Thus, the stone blocks were replaced with light and much cheaper materials. Besides, some rooms were decorated using a special material licensed by

Henri Coandă Henri Marie Coandă (; 7 June 1886 – 25 November 1972)''Flight'' 1973 was a Romanian inventor, aerodynamics pioneer, and builder of an experimental aircraft, the Coandă-1910, which never flew. He invented a great number of devices, designed ...

, under the name of bois-ciment and imitating the oak wood. Decorative ironmongery elements are also remarkable and they can be admired for instance on the doors of the Voivodes’ Hall. The building was also equipped with high-tech facilities for those times, such as electric lighting, (pneumatic) heating, ventilation system, thermostat, vacuum cleaners, which were all directed from the machinery room, at the underground level. Taking also into account the 14 fires that affected the previous buildings, Berindei (the main architect) treated the wooden structure of the attic with an ignifugeous product called orniton, while for the roof he used a special material, named eternite.

Clock Tower

The entrance of the palace is through a great donjon tower, with crenels and alcoves dominated by an eagle with open wings. The tower is the central architectural piece of the palace. On each of the three exposed sides there is a face of the clock with a diameter of . The clock faces are decorated with stained glass representing the 12 astrological signs. Two young men dressed in national costumes, are painted on the sides of the clock faces guarding the clock (design element inspired from the

Peleș Castle Peleș Castle ( ) is a Neo-Renaissance palace in the Royal Domain of Sinaia in the Carpathian Mountains, near Sinaia, in Prahova County, Romania, on an existing medieval route linking Transylvania and Wallachia, built between 1873 and 1914 ...

). The stained glass windows and the cross shaped crenelations are electrically illuminated during the night. The

Carillon A carillon ( , ) is a pitched percussion instrument that is played with a musical keyboard, keyboard and consists of at least 23 bells. The bells are Bellfounding, cast in Bell metal, bronze, hung in fixed suspension, and Musical tuning, tu ...

in the tower has 8 bells that are singing each hour the song "

Hora Unirii "Hora Unirii" ('Hora of the Union') is a poem by Vasile Alecsandri, published in 1856. The music of the song was composed by . The song is sung and danced especially on 24 January, the anniversary of the day in which the Romanian United Principali ...

" with the help of a drum with 69 pins.

Moldova National Museum Complex

The ''"Moldova" National Museum Complex'' () hosts four museums located in the Palace of Culture: Art Museum, Moldavia's History Museum, Ethnographic Museum of Moldavia, and "Ștefan Procopiu" Science and Technique Museum. The Museums also comprise their own stores and libraries, as well as halls for temporary exhibitions.

Art Museum

The ''Art Museum'', founded in 1860, is the oldest and has the largest art collection in Romania, with more than 8,700 works, out of which 1,000 belong to the national and universal patrimony.Complexul Muzeal National Moldova Iasi-Raport de activitate
Located at the first floor of the palace, it has 24 rooms for permanent exhibitions, arranged in three galleries (Universal Art Gallery, Romanian Modern Art Gallery and Contemporary Art Gallery). The galleries contain works by artists such as

Caravaggio Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (also Michele Angelo Merigi or Amerighi da Caravaggio; 29 September 1571 – 18 July 1610), known mononymously as Caravaggio, was an Italian painter active in Rome for most of his artistic life. During the fina ...

Paolo Veronese Paolo Caliari (152819 April 1588), known as Paolo Veronese ( , ; ), was an Italian Renaissance painter based in Venice, known for extremely large history paintings of religion and mythology, such as ''The Wedding at Cana (Veronese), The Wedding ...

, Pietro Liberi,

Carlo Dolci Carlo (or Carlino) Dolci (25 May 1616 – 17 January 1686) was an Italian Baroque painter, active mainly in Florence, known for highly finished religious pictures, often repeated in many versions. Biography He was born in Florence, on his mother' ...

Salvator Rosa Salvator Rosa (1615 – March 15, 1673) is best known today as an Italian Baroque painter, whose romanticized landscapes and history paintings, often set in dark and untamed nature, exerted considerable influence from the 17th century into the ...

Francesco Solimena Francesco Solimena (4 October 1657 – 3 April 1747) was a prolific Italian Baroque painter, one of an established family of painters and draughtsmen. Biography Francesco Solimena was born in Canale di Serino in the province of Avellino. H ...

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo Bartolomé Esteban Murillo ( , ; late December 1617, baptized January 1, 1618April 3, 1682) was a Spanish Baroque painter. Although he is best known for his religious works, Murillo also produced a considerable number of paintings of contempor ...

Anthony van Dyck Sir Anthony van Dyck (; ; 22 March 1599 – 9 December 1641) was a Flemish Baroque painting, Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England after success in the Spanish Netherlands and Italy. The seventh child of ...

, Jan Both,

Bartholomeus van der Helst Bartholomeus van der Helst (1613 – buried 16 December 1670) was a Dutch painter. Considered to be one of the leading portrait painters of the Dutch Golden Age, his elegant portraits gained him the patronage of Amsterdam's elite as well as th ...

, Egbert van Heemskerk II,

Nicolas Poussin Nicolas Poussin (, , ; June 1594 – 19 November 1665) was a French painter who was a leading painter of the classical French Baroque style, although he spent most of his working life in Rome. Most of his works were on religious and mythologic ...

Philippe de Champaigne Philippe de Champaigne (; 26 May 1602 – 12 August 1674) was a Duchy of Brabant, Brabant-born French people, French Baroque era painter, a major exponent of the French art, French school. He was a founding member of the Académie royale de pein ...

, Eustache Le Sueur, Guillaume Coustou,

François Boucher François Boucher ( , ; ; 29 September 1703 – 30 May 1770) was a French painter, draughtsman and etcher, who worked in the Rococo style. Boucher is known for his idyllic and voluptuous paintings on classical themes, decorative allegories ...

, and many others.

Moldavia's History Museum

The ''Moldavia's History Museum'' was founded in 1916 and offers more than 48,000 objects from various fields: archaeology,

numismatics Numismatics is the study or collection of currency, including coins, tokens, paper money, medals, and related objects. Specialists, known as numismatists, are often characterized as students or collectors of coins, but the discipline also inclu ...

, decorative art, ancient books, documents, etc. One of the oldest items, a 70,000-year-old mammoth skull, is from the Middle

Palaeolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic ( years ago) ( ), also called the Old Stone Age (), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost the entire period of human prehist ...

Era. Among other items of significance are pottery from the Cucuteni culture,

Dacia Dacia (, ; ) was the land inhabited by the Dacians, its core in Transylvania, stretching to the Danube in the south, the Black Sea in the east, and the Tisza in the west. The Carpathian Mountains were located in the middle of Dacia. It thus ro ...

Sarmatian The Sarmatians (; ; Latin: ) were a large confederation of Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Iranian Eurasian nomads, equestrian nomadic peoples who dominated the Pontic–Caspian steppe, Pontic steppe from about the 5th century BCE to the 4t ...

, Gothic, and

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

artifacts, and armory and other items of the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

. The History Museum is located inside the palace in the west wing of the ground floor, and is the continuation of the Antiquity Museum founded by Orest Tafrali in 1916. It has four sections, prehistory and ancient history, medieval history, modern history and contemporary history, presenting the main aspects of the development of the communities in the area from the Paleolithic time to the World War II. The "Union Museum" and "

Mihail Kogălniceanu Mihail Kogălniceanu (; also known as Mihail Cogâlniceanu, Michel de Kogalnitchan; September 6, 1817 – July 1, 1891) was a Romanian Liberalism, liberal statesman, lawyer, historian and publicist; he became Prime Minister of Romania on Octo ...

Memorial Museum", in Iași, " Al. I. Cuza Memorial Palace" in Ruginoasa, and the "Archaeological Reserve of Cucuteni", are also coordinated by the Moldavia's History Museum.

Ethnographic Museum of Moldavia

The ''Ethnographic Museum of Moldavia'', founded in 1943, owns more than 13,000 objects depicting the Romanian advance through the ages. The Moldavian Museum of Ethnography is located in the West side of the Palace, on the first and second floor. One can admire here the objects used by the inhabitants of Moldavia in their every day activities: in agriculture,

viticulture Viticulture (, "vine-growing"), viniculture (, "wine-growing"), or winegrowing is the cultivation and harvesting of grapes. It is a branch of the science of horticulture. While the native territory of ''Vitis vinifera'', the common grape vine ...

, raising animals, fishing, hunting,

apiculture Beekeeping (or apiculture, from ) is the maintenance of bee colonies, commonly in artificial beehives. Honey bees in the genus ''Apis (bee), Apis'' are the most commonly kept species but other honey producing bees such as ''Melipona'' stingless be ...

. One can also see interiors of peasant houses, devices used for pottery, weaving, wood processing, mask collections, traditional costumes. Many of these exhibits are more than 100 years old. The museum, also, coordinates the ''Wine and Vineyard Museum'' in Hârlău.

Science and Technology Museum

The ''"Ștefan Procopiu" Science and Technique Museum'', with a collection of more than 8,500 objects, was founded in 1955 as the "Polytechnical Museum" and renamed, in 1994, after the physicist Ștefan Procopiu. It is home to ''Energetics'', ''Sound Recording and Playback'' (unique within Romania), ''Telecommunications'', ''Mineralogy - Cristalography'', and ''Computers'' sections.Science and Technology Museum
/ref> The " Poni- Cernătescu" Memorial Museum in Iași, is also under the direct coordination of the Science and Technique Museum.

Other attractions

Besides the four museums, The Palace of Culture also houses some other attractions, such as the ''Gothic Room'', which contains a mosaic that presents a medieval bestiarum (gryphons, bicephalous eagles, lions). There is also the ''Voivodes' Room'', located on first floor, where there are the portraits of Moldavia's rulers and Romania's kings, starting with

Decebalus Decebalus (; ), sometimes referred to as Diurpaneus, was the last Dacians, Dacian king. He is famous for fighting three wars, with varying success, against the Roman Empire under two emperors. After raiding south across the Danube, he defeated a R ...

and

Trajan Trajan ( ; born Marcus Ulpius Traianus, 18 September 53) was a Roman emperor from AD 98 to 117, remembered as the second of the Five Good Emperors of the Nerva–Antonine dynasty. He was a philanthropic ruler and a successful soldier ...

, as well as paintings by

Ștefan Dimitrescu Ștefan Dimitrescu (January 18, 1886 – May 22, 1933) was a Romanian Post-Impressionism, Post-impressionist painter and draftsman. Biography Born in Huşi, Huși into a modest family, he completed his primary and secondary studies in his ho ...

and his students. Then there is ''"Henri Coandă" Room'', which was named after the carvings and relief works made by the famous Romanian inventor of a cement invented by him. On the right there is the ''Turnul de Strajă'' (the Watch Tower), reminiscence of the old Princely Court of Iași, along with the galleries underneath the court of the palace. On the left there is a collection of capitals and other stone architectonic elements grouped in a lapidarium. The hall is superposed by a glass ceiling room, where initially a greenhouse was arranged. In front of the palace there is the

equestrian statue An equestrian statue is a statue of a rider mounted on a horse, from the Latin ''eques'', meaning 'knight', deriving from ''equus'', meaning 'horse'. A statue of a riderless horse is strictly an equine statue. A full-sized equestrian statue is a ...

Stephen the Great Stephen III, better known as Stephen the Great (; ; died 2 July 1504), was List of rulers of Moldavia, Voivode (or Prince) of Moldavia from 1457 to 1504. He was the son of and co-ruler with Bogdan II of Moldavia, Bogdan II, who was murdered in ...

, framed by two

Krupp Friedrich Krupp AG Hoesch-Krupp (formerly Fried. Krupp AG and Friedrich Krupp GmbH), trade name, trading as Krupp, was the largest company in Europe at the beginning of the 20th century as well as Germany's premier weapons manufacturer dur ...

cannons A cannon is a large-caliber gun classified as a type of artillery, which usually launches a projectile using explosive chemical propellant. Gunpowder ("black powder") was the primary propellant before the invention of smokeless powder during t ...

, trophies from the

Romanian War of Independence The Romanian War of Independence () is the name used in Romanian historiography to refer to the phase of the Russo-Turkish War (1877–78), in which Romania, fighting on the Russian side of the war, gained independence from the Ottoman Empire. On ...

Gallery

File:Palatul Culturii din Iasi.jpg, Front view from the Palace Square File:Ias, Public Garden Palas 23.jpg, Rear view from the Palas Garden File:Aerial view of the Palace of Culture in Iași, Romania DJI 0260.jpg, Aerial view File:RO IS Stefan cel Mare statue 1.jpeg, Statue of

File:Iaşi , Palatul Culturii 14.JPG, Details File:Piața Palat, Iași, Roumanie.jpg, General view File:Palatul culturii iasi.jpg, Palace Square and Princely Saint Nicholas Church File:Iasi, Administrative Palace (Palace of Culture).jpg, Interwar postcard

References

External links

Palatul Culturii în 100 de imagini. Povestea edificiului simbol al IaşuluiOfficial site360 inside view

Iași Palace of Culture, the most representative building of the Gothic Revival architecture in Romania
*[https://www.ziaruldeiasi.ro/stiri/arhive-rusesti-palatul-culturii-poate-fi-numit-a-palatul-din-iasia-cu-o-istorie-de-200-de-ani--243384.html Arhive ruseşti: Palatul Culturii poate fi numit „Palatul din Iaşi“, cu o istorie de 200 de ani] {{DEFAULTSORT:Palace Of Culture (Iasi) Historic monuments in Iași County Buildings and structures in Iași Gothic Revival architecture in Romania [ ategory:Museums in Iași Official residences in Romania Palaces in Romania National museums of Romania

Art Museum An art museum or art gallery is a building or space for the display of art, usually from the museum's own Collection (artwork), collection. It might be in public or private ownership, be accessible to all, or have restrictions in place. Although ...

Moldavia's History Museum Ethnographic museums in Romania Science museums in Romania Buildings and structures completed in 1925