The Anatomical Theatre upstairs in the Archiginnasio is a single perfectly preserved room — finished in 1637 and rebuilt after a 1944 Allied bomb destroyed it. Tiered benches in carved spruce wood face the white marble dissecting table in the centre; statues of famous physicians line the walls; on the chair of the lecturer two flayed wooden figures, the Spellati, stand as if reading along.
Dissections here were public events through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, attended by the city's nobility and clergy. The carving on the ceiling, the statues, the symbolism of the figures — all of it speaks to a culture that put scientific demonstration on the same level as theatre. A ticket from the Archiginnasio Library covers entry.