The museum bears witness to two thousand years of uninterrupted gold prospecting in the Biella area and in the north of Italy.

A visit  is followed by a walk through the Roman goldfields and a practice-session on the river; all in the company of our experts.

In the ground-floor hall there is a presentation of the geological formation of the Bessa and of gold, clarifying the difference between native gold, tridimensional in shape and alloyed with quartz, and alluvial gold in the form of chips.

You can also see  the original techniques and instruments for gold prospecting, subdivided according to the area which they belong to: the cupun of the Elvo, the gave of the Orco, the trulle of the Ticino, the banconi of the Adda, pans and sluices of various shapes.

On the upper floor, in the historical section, the finds, the techniques for extraction and the principal archaeological sites of the Bessa are illustrated.

The journey continues through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, with the presentation of diplomas of various emperors who granted concessions for the working of the rivers to bishops and local nobility. Following this there are models and illustrations on prospecting in the XVII and XVIII centuries along with company shares, historical photographs and geological surveys of the XIX and XX centuries.

In the basement, the last section includes  hundreds of specimens of gold extracted from the rivers of the Padana plain, as well as information relative to the native goldmines of Monte Rosa, the grinding and amalgamating of extracted material and to the creation of wooden implements  for use in prospecting on the river.

The idea of the Museum was then developed from 1998 on, thanks to the links with the Elvo Valley and Serra Eco-Museum Association, which is a part of the Biella Eco-Museum, in its own turn a part of the Piemonte Eco-Museum system.