Emilio Museum and Joyce Lussu

The story of two extraordinary protagonists of the twentieth century

The Historical Museum “Emilio and Joyce Lussu” is located along the main street of the village and is housed inside the Casa del Segretario, an important 19th-century manor house that once belonged to the Dessì family. The complex preserves a set of characteristic elements, such as the old “ball-shaped” oven used for bread-making, the well, and a private chapel, which has been converted into a screening room after restoration. The main courtyard, once intended for work activities, is now used for events and cultural programs. 

A place of memory and exhibition, the museum traces the human and political lives of Emilio Lussu, a politician and writer from Armungia, and of Joyce Lussu Salvadori, writer, partisan, and life companion. The exhibition itinerary consists of images, documents, works, in-depth materials, and autobiographical memories. The main section of the museum is dedicated to the biography of Emilio Lussu: from his origins to his political experience in the post–World War II period, including the Great War with the “Sassari” Brigade, the founding of the Sardinian Action Party, the anti-fascist struggle, and exile. Along the route, several multimedia spaces allow visitors to view photographs, digitized historical documents, film reconstructions, and interviews. Testifying to his bond with Armungia, its places, and its community are the photographs by Franco Caruso that make up the exhibition “1971. Emilio, his family, his home, his Armungia.” Another section documents Lussu’s experience in the First World War, starting from the pages of One Year on the Plateau, an authentic masterpiece of international literature written during the years of exile. Joyce Lussu, a political and cultural activist and recipient of the Silver Medal for Military Valor for the Resistance, is honored with the photographic exhibition “The Path of a Woman in the History of the Twentieth Century.”

Connected to the Lussu Museum are the new spaces of the Cultural Hub on Viale Gramsci, where Emilio Lussu’s study has been reinstalled, originally located in his home in Cagliari, the site of the fascist assault of 31 October 1926. Here, the exhibition dedicated to the historical posters of the Sardinian Institute for the History of the Resistance and Autonomy is also on display.