Overall Impact:                **** 4 stars – small Museum but some stunning finds well set out

Access                                ***** 5 stars – easy access by all modes – it’s Switzerland after all!

Atmosphere                      **** 4 star – works admirably hard to relate finds to excavations

Other                                  *** 3 stars – great to find so much so well done for what is, when all said and done, a quite minor site!

The best finds from Roman Lousonna are displayed in a modern building situated within the surviving foundations of a very grand Roman merchant’s house with warehouses attached (or that is what it appears to have been).   You enter pay your CHF8 (concessions CHF5 and children free) then climb upstairs above walls with preserved painted wall plaster.

The quality of the finds from this small Gallo-Roman town of the Helvetii rather put the finds from small Roman towns in Britannia to shame – or at least it felt that way to us.  Here are just a few examples:

The quality of carving on the various inscriptions is very fine. We thought the finest single artefact was the small but very detailed bronze relief of a priest pouring a libation over the unfortunate bull prior to sacrifice, thought to be a decoration from an altar.

The models of Lousonna are of the highest standard, comparable to the wonderful building models in the Museum of London’s Roman Galleries.   There is an English catalogue you can borrow to carry round with you, although sadly not available to purchase.

Finally, the Museum goes to some effort with a re-construction of a sizeable cross-section of the excavation in a mock-up of a site hut, together with finds records etc on the wall to show how the dig had taken place.

So if you are in the area, don’t miss Lousonna!