Indian Museum

Indian Museum, located in Kolkata (Calcutta), oldest and largest museum in the Asia-Pacific region. The museum is a specimen of Neoclassical architecture and houses multiple galleries split into six sections—archaeology, anthropology, art, zoology, economic botany, and geology. Among the objects in the museum’s vast collection are archaeological relics, sculptures, ancient coins, textiles, and paintings that represent India’s rich cultural heritage and history.

History

In 1814 the Asiatic Society, an organization dedicated to the promotion of multidisciplinary research pertaining to Asia, established a museum on its premises at Park Street, Calcutta (now Kolkata). The initial collection of the society’s museum comprised curated and donated artifacts. In 1878 the museum’s exhibits were moved to a new facility at Chowringhee Road (now Jawaharlal Nehru Road), Calcutta, and this building came to be known as the Indian Museum. In the same year two galleries were opened for public viewing.

Galleries and exhibits

The museum’s Egypt gallery is home to a variety of relics, including a 4,000-year-old Egyptian mummy. The coin gallery contains a large collection of South Asian coins. Notable items include coins depicting Samudra Gupta, an emperor of the Gupta dynasty (320–510 ce) in ancient India, playing the veena; gold coins issued by Kanishka, a ruler of the Kushan dyansty (c. 2nd century bce–3rd century ce); and a gold coin engraved with an image of the Mughal emperor Jahangir’s face.

The Bharhut gallery features the remains of the Bharhut stupa (mound-like structure), built in the Shunga period (c. 185 bce–73 bce). The relics are especially noted for their intricate relief work; events related to the life of the Buddha and scenes from Jataka are recurrent themes. A diverse array of sculptures representing various schools of South Asian art are in the archaeology gallery. The museum’s collection of paintings include an extensive assortment of artworks, such as Mughal paintings and pieces from the Bengal School of Art. The museum showcases fossils of invertebrate species and mammalian bones, fossils, and skeletons.

The museum also has terra-cotta pieces dating to the Mauryan empire (c. 321–185 bce) and engraved Babylonian and Sasanian gems. Artifacts from Mohenjo-daro, an archaeological site where remains of the Indus civilization (c. 2500–1700 bce) were discovered, are part of the museum’s collection.