Count Carlo Vidua of Conzano’s rediscovered shell collection

Research carried out on the malacological collections of the University of Turin, currently housed at the Regional Museum of Natural Sciences in Turin, or MRSN, brought to light the earliest portion of the shell collection once belonging to Count Carlo Vidua of Conzano (1785 – 1830).

The investigation was launched in September 2024 by Sara Scapinello, a technician from the Zoological Section of the MRSN, after Pier Maria Stabile, director of the State Archives of Imperia, asked for information on whether the shells were actually in the museum within the scope of his investigation into the Count of Conzano .

Vidua, a lively intellectual and traveller of an unconventional spirit, played a key role in securing the Egyptian collection for the House of Savoy in 1824. The collection, assembled by the French Consul-general in Egypt Bernardo Drovetti, served as the core of the Egyptian Museum in Turin, which was established in 1824.

The nobleman went far beyond playing a pivotal role in establishing the Egyptian Museum. His wide-ranging, inquisitive mind drove him into ammassing a diverse array of items while travelling across the globe: weapons, shells, paintings, drawings, archaeological finds, prints, clothes, fans, and other artefacts currently preserved in a number of Italian museums, including the MRSN.

Based on the Memoirs of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Turin, Pio Vidua, Carlo's father, donated a collection of over 2,000 Indonesian shells to the Academy in 1833. Carlo shipped the specimens to Italy just before departing for his final, fatal expedition to Sulawesi, Indonesia, in August 1830.

At the time, the Academy held the natural history collections of the University of Turin, before they were moved to Palazzo Carignano first and eventually to the current venue of the MRSN, hosted in a section of the former San Giovanni Battista Hospital, on Giolitti Street wing.

All these factors inspired Sara Scapinello in her mission to find specimens both in the museum's ancient handwritten catalogues and amongst the countless specimens making up the impressive historical malacological collection, which numbers around 300,000 specimens.

The catalogues, although incomplete, mention 45 specimens, mainly bivalves and gastropods, attributed to the Vidua collection. Seven of them have been found so far, all bivalve molluscs from the Indo-Pacific.

However, further, more in-depth examination might uncover additional, previously overlooked items or evidence..

The discovery is reported in Stabile's essay, titled Carlo Vidua artefice del Museo Egizio: Storie di un viaggiatore cosmopolita, in English Carlo Vidua, founder of the Egyptian Museum: Stories of a cosmopolitan traveller. The essay represents the earliest documented evidence of the presence of this specific collection's components within the MRSN.