Mainz - Landesmuseum

Mainz was founded around 20 BC by the Romans under the name “Mogontiacum” as a military camp. Today's capital of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate forms a metropolitan area with Wiesbaden, the neighboring capital of Hesse, with a combined population of around 500,000.

The "Republic of Mainz", a product of the French Revolution, was the first democratic state on German territory. The state was represented in Paris by the well-known naturalist Georg Forster, who had been in the Pacific with Captain Cook as a boy. The Mainz Republic ended after only five months in July 1793 following the conquest of the city by Prussian and Austrian troops. Georg Forster died in Paris in 1794.

The State Museum is one of the oldest museums in Germany. Its origins lie in a collection of 36 paintings that Napoleon gifted to the city of Mainz in 1803 to establish an art gallery.

Today, the museum boasts a thematically diverse collection. The collection of Roman stone monuments alone comprises over 2,000 pieces.




Colossal head of (probably) Emperor Julian (nephew of Constantine I), who liberated the city of Mainz from the Germanic tribes in 357. The sculpture originates from the late Roman city wall of Mainz, where it was evidently reused.