The Biology Hall

This is one of the museum’s most interesting sections. For the most part, the material exhibited here was gathered in Capri, prevalently, various examples of the island’s marine fauna. In order to conduct this research Cerio designed a special dredger which captured various forms of flora and fauna as well as incoherent sediment from the sea bed surrounding Capri up to a depth of some 500 meters. This activity which was subsequently developed during the oceanographic studies by Krupp and Lo Bianco, attracted the foremost scholars of Malacology of the time including Tommaso Di Maria Alleri, the Marquis of Monterosato, and Raffaello Bellini. Already at the time, these studies led to a more in-depth knowledge of not only the fauna of land molluscs but that of marine molluscs in the Gulf of Naples as well as their bathymetric distribution.  At the same time, Ignazio Cerio also became involved in studying land fauna and promoted studies on the blue-tinted lizard of the Faraglioni of which the Museum has a few fluid preserved specimens. This particular variety of saurian, is characterised by cobalt tinged scales on their backs and their bellies are a garishly vivid Sevres Blue. This species of lizard was the cause of heated scientific controversy as regards to its systematic position, the reasons for its bluish colouring and its systemic position and the evolutionary implications.

Among the other marine and land organisms gathered by Cerio or for which he promoted studies, the Museum has interesting specimens of sponges, echinoderms including sea urchins and starfish, arthropods and Cnidarians including large colonies of red coral. Additionally, the Museum also boasts a rare herbal collection of some 200 species of plants from the island however, owing to the fragile nature of this collection, it can only be observed by scholars.