As both of us are doctors, we couldn't pass up the opportunity to visit the Palazzo Bo and see the world's first dissection theatre.Although there was a graduation ceremony taking place which precluded us visiting some of the other rooms, learning about the history of Padua University and seeing some of the great historical rooms was amazing.We also visited the ancient medical library (tours need to be arranged beforehand via email with the librarian), where medical books and manuscripts from the 14th century onwards and old medical instruments are kept.
The English-language tour is informative and the anatomical theatre is really a must-see for anyone interested in the history of medicine and science.
The University of Padua is the second oldest university in Italy. You need a guided tour to visit the university. Guided tours of Palazzo del Bo include the anatomical theatre and also the Galileo Galilei’s Aula Magna and the Aula di Medicina where lectures on medicine given.Recomended..
We were astonished by the list of faculty and graduates of the University. Try Galileo and Copernicus for starters - and they were not even in the Medical School. The paintings of the famous medical students reflected how important Padua was in educating the future medical teachers of Europe. The anatomy theater tour placed you where you got a cadaver-eye view of the spectators, so to speak. Alas, visitors must join a group. Our guide was good, but the group too large and the price a bit steep. Time and group size made the presentation rather general and our questions remained unasked until after the tour ended.
The university provides tours each day which includes the anatomy theatre in which Galeleo performed his lectures.
Inspiring to stand where Galileo, Copernicus, Petrarch and ?Dante studied! Hard to believe it has been in existence that long and now has 60,000 students. Hope they will be able to find jobs when they graduate!
The university is fascinating and the tour guide that we had was excellent in her knowledge of the history of the university, the famous students that attended and its architecture. The only thing that spoiled it was the terrible jobs worth security guard who took relish in moving people on and telling people off even If they were in a mm of a piece of furniture. Even the guide looked embarrassed by him. Please someone have a word he does not need to be like that.
Guided tour is informative and interesting. You visit the 16th century anatomy theatre, sadly so fragile that you only look up from beneath (i.e. the spot formerly occupied by the cadaver!), also the medical school hall and a great lecture hall decorated with the family crests of students who had attended. Also on show is Galileo's lectern, on the face of it a pretty shabby old piece of wood, but the repository of scientific history!
Palazzo del Bo is the main building of the University of Padova, which is the second oldest university in Italy, built in 1922. Galileo was giving lectures there. You need to join a guided tour to visit the university. It takes 1 hour and you can see the world's oldest anatomical theater and "Aula di Medicina", where lectures on medicine were originally given. In the meeting room there is a display of skulls, which belong to the university professors who donated their body as cadaver. All the rooms are very interesting. Our tour was given in Italian and English. The tickets are sold 15 minutes before the tours begin, but the number of tickets are limited. We had to wait for the next tour because the tickets were sold out. So I suggest to be there 30 minutes before the tour starts.
This is where you can visit the world’s first permanent anatomical theatre but you can also see Galileo Galilei's podium! What an overwhelming opportunity this was. This is where the first woman in the world to graduate got her degree in Philosophy. Her name was Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia and she was from Venice. This was 1678.