The Globe Room is located in Palazzo dei Priori in Fermo. The wooden Globe was designed by abbot Amanzio Moroncelli in 1713.
The most ancient and famous room of the Fermo Civic Art Gallery is surely the Globe Room, located in Palazzo dei Priori.
Formerly known as Comedies Room, it was built by the wish of Fermo cardinal Decio Azzolino, in order to house the aristocratic Paolo Ruffo’s bequest and it was made by Adamo Sacripante, an architect from Fermo.
On the entrance door a medallion contains a dedication: “Cristina”. It is the only direct reference to the singular person of the queen (without the throne) Christine of Sweden, who became particularly friend with Fermo Cardinal Azzolino, who wanted to celebrate her with this work.
In the room, many texts coming from the collection of the physician Romolo Spezioli from Fermo and a large part of the ancient fund of the Civic Library dedicated to him are preserved.
Its structure is completely covered with wood and it is divided into two floors with a walkway. The walnut wood shelving, the carved fir ceiling and the ancient armchairs give the room a great fascination.
The collection includes about 3000 manuscripts, 127 codices, 300.000 books including 681 incunabula, more than 15.000 16th century editions, 23.000 miscellaneous editions, numerous examples of 17th and 18th century editions and musical printings. Moreover, more than 800 historic periodicals, 5.000 drawings and 6.500 engravings, coins, seals and relics of various kinds are available.
The preserved books, printed and handwritten, are ordered following a practical order, from the smallest and less bulky books on the upper shelves, to the biggest on the lower shelves. You can see Roman numerals indicating horizontal shelves and Latin letters indicating vertical shelves, whose combination is used to find the position of each book, using catalogues.
In addition to the large number of volumes, in the Globe Room is located the Globe designed by abbot Amanzio Moroncelli in 1713, when he was cosmographer of the queen Christine of Sweden.
It is a large size globe (5,68 m in circumference and 1,85 m in diameter), whose wooden structure was realized by Filippo Morroni from Fermo, with the external cover made of Fabriano paper.
The cartographic question is very interesting because it represents accurately the entire world as it was known until then: the free surfaces representing the seas are embellished with drawings of fish and marine monsters, mythological characters and reconstructions of the ships of the time, ornaments and inscriptions.
The Globe was given to the Library in 1782 by Giuseppe Ignazio Morrone that had preserved it until that time in his house.
In addition to the large globe, the Library also preserves nautical maps, plants and geographical figures and a famous pilot book from the XVII century.
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