Emigration Museum in Cavasso Nuovo

The Emigration Museum in Cavasso Nuovo (Friuli) illustrates the characteristics of the migratory flows that have affected western Friuli since the 15th century. A section of the Museum is dedicated to female emigration, from the earliest forms of street peddling to the emigration of working-class women after World War II.

The Emigration Museum in Cavasso Nuovo, a small village in the Italian northeastern region of Friuli, opened on 16 September 2000 at Polcenigo-Fanna Palace (also known as Palazat). The museum structure, one of the first in Italy dedicated to emigration, presents a complete framework of the migratory flows and destinations of workers from Western Friuli. A section of the Museum “Nannies, maids, workers, grass widows: migrant women and the women of emigrants” is devoted to the female migration experience. The section highlights how female work and agency, of women who have left and of those who have not left, mark the great transformations and the laborious social and economic progress that have impacted Friuli in all its aspects since the late 19th century.  

The provincial dimension of the Museum follows a very precise logic: understanding the characteristics of emigration from Friuli as a whole presupposes the study of the different territorial specificities, even at a village level, but in a complex dimension. Indeed, in western Friuli and in the Friuli Region in general, the events of the recent past are closely linked to emigration, an experience which has involved almost every Friulian family.