The Archaeological Museum Portus Scabris

If you look out of the window of Piper apartments or out of the terrasse, you’ll see a marvellous swamp: it’s a safeguarded area full of channels, rich vegetation of rushes and reeds and numerous species of birds like hawks, least bitterns and sedge warblers.

If you want to know which was the past of this area, there is no better place than MAPS, a small pearl of a museum which conserves archaeological remains found during the excavation of the touristic port of Puntone of Scarlino.

The place where you are now used to be a basin where the port Scabris was located in Etruscan and Roman epoch. The gulf was protected by the spit of Follonica, exactly like it was the lake Prile in the plain of Castiglione della Pescaia which is located just a few kilometres south of this place.

The museum is made inside a historical two-storeyed building dating back to the reclamation of the XIXth century. It conserves a beautiful collection of amphoras and other objects found in the holds of the transport ships which sailed in the local waters: these were the most important paths for the trade of raw materials coming from the metalliferous hills. The infographics of the museum will tell you all the history, starting from the Etruscan epoch until nowadays, by showing the reproductions of the excavation sites and presenting the notions of the antique nautical techniques.

The entrance is free of charge during the  low season and it costs 3,00€ in summer.