Cirta Museum

Lonely Planet review

The city doesn't have much to show for its illustrious past, but the colonial-period Cirta Museum has proof enough. The collection comes from excavations in the city and nearby Tiddis and with the displays being something of a jumble, it appears as an old-style 'cabinet of curiosities'. But there are some stunning pieces, the highlights include a seated terracotta figure from a 2nd-century BC tomb and an exquisite marble bust of a woman known as the 'beauty of Djemila'.

Also worth seeing is the beautifully cast bronze sculpture of winged 'Victory of Constantine', found by soldiers while excavating the streets of the Casbah in 1855. If you are planning a visit to the Roman site at Tiddis, look out for the collection marked Vie quotidienne à Tiddis (Daily Life in Tiddis). The museum also houses a small collection of paintings by Algerian and French Orientalists, including a study of a horse by the French 19th-century romantic Eugène Fromentin.