Curtius Museum

The Curtius Museum (Musée Curtius) is a museum of archaeology and decorative arts, located on the bank of the river Meuse in Liège, Belgium, classified as a Major Heritage of Wallonia.

Curtius Museum

It was built sometime between 1597 and 1610 as a private mansion for Jean Curtius, industrialist and munitions supplier to the Spanish army. With its alternating layers of red brick and natural stone, and its cross-mullioned windows, the building typifies the regional style known as Mosan Renaissance architecture.[1]

After a 50 million euro redevelopment, the museum reopened as the Grand Curtius (Le Grand Curtius) in March 2009, now housing the merged collections of four former museums: the museum of archeology, the museum of weaponry, the museum of decorative arts, and the museum of religious art and Mosan art.[2] Highlights in the collections include treasures of Mosan art such as a twelfth-century gilded reliquary triptych, formerly in the church of Sainte-Croix, the Evangelarium of Notger, sculptures by Jean Del Cour, and a portrait of Napoleon Bonaparte painted by Ingres in 1804: Bonaparte, First Consul.

Image from an 1898 postcard.