Coțofenești helmet
Dacian gold with eyes staring for 2,400 years.
Diego Delso — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Joe Mabel — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Joe Mabel — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Joe Mabel — CC BY-SA 4.0
The old Postal Palace on Calea Victoriei keeps the country's memory from the Stone Age to the twentieth century — and its jewel lies underground: the Historical Treasury, the heaviest gold hoard in Eastern Europe, from the Dacian golden helmet of Coțofenești (fourth century BC) to the Gothic Pietroasa treasure and the crowns of modern Romania's kings. Above it stands a full-size cast of Trajan's Column in Rome — the only complete plaster copy in the world — read up close as if from the scaffold: the war that made the Dacians Roman and Romania a name. The building is among the city's finest nineteenth-century palaces; the marble staircase and the dome deserve as long a look as the exhibits.
Dacian gold with eyes staring for 2,400 years.
A full-size cast read at arm's length.
Carol I's crown forged from a captured Turkish cannon.
Calea Victoriei 12, Bucharest
Stavropoleos MonasteryIn a narrow lane behind the noise of Lipscani stands the most beautiful small ch2 minutes walk4.9
Lipscani — the Old TownLipscani is what remains of old Bucharest: a grid of narrow pedestrian streets b4 minutes walk4.7
The National Military ClubThe Cercul Militar Național stands at a junction on Calea Victoriei, and is one 5 minutes walk4.4
St George's New ChurchSt George's New Church stands at the edge of Lipscani, and holds two places in R7 minutes walk4.7
University SquareUniversity Square is where modern Romania happened. A wide junction ringed by th8 minutes walk4.4Carol I wanted a crown from the metal of a cannon his army captured in the 1877 war of independence — a symbol of sacrifice, not wealth.