Museum sights in Mongolia
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Zanabazar Museum of Fine Arts
The Zanabazar Museum of Fine Arts has a superb collection of paintings, carvings and sculptures, including many by the revered sculptor and artist Zanabazar. It also contains other rare, and sometimes old, religious exhibits such as scroll thangka(paintings) and Buddhist statues, representing the best display of its kind in Mongolia. A bonus is that most of the exhibit captions in the museum are in English.
The second room contains some fine examples of the sculptor's work including five Dhyani, or Contemplation, Buddhas (cast in 1683) and Tara in her 21 manifestations.
Also worth checking out are the wonderful tsam masks (worn by monks during religious ceremonies) and the…
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National Museum of Mongolian History
Still sometimes referred to by its previous name, the Revolutionary Museum, the National Museum of Mongolian History is an Ulaanbaatar highlight.
The recently renovated 1st floor has some interesting exhibits on Stone Age sites in Mongolia (dating back 700,000 years), as well as petroglyphs, deer stones (stone sculptures of reindeer and other animals) and burial sites from the Hun and Uighur eras.
The 2nd floor houses an outstanding collection of costumes, hats and jewellery, representing most of Mongolia's ethnic groups. Take a gander as some of the elaborate silverwork of the Dariganga minority or the outrageous headgear worn by Khalkh Mongols. Some of the outfits conta…
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Winter Palace of Bogd Khan
Built between 1893 and 1903, this palace is the place where Mongolia's eighth Living Buddha, and last king, Jebtzun Damba Hutagt VIII (often called the Bogd Khan), lived for 20 years. For reasons that are unclear, the palace was spared destruction by the Russians and turned into a museum. The summer palace, on the banks of Tuul Gol, was completely destroyed.
There are six temples in the grounds. The white building to the right as you enter is the Winter Palace itself. It contains a collection of gifts received from foreign dignitaries, such as a pair of golden boots from a Russian tsar, a robe made from 80 unfortunate foxes and a ger lined with the skins of 150 snow leopa…
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Museum of Natural History
The Museum of Natural History is a serious throwback to the Soviet era. It has exhibits featuring Mongolia's geography, flora and fauna, including the requisite section with stuffed and embalmed animals, birds and even fish. The general impression, however, is that you've stumbled into the warehouse of a long-deceased taxidermist, rather than into a serious scientific exhibition. Some of the animals have been fixed with puzzling expressions, as if they remain perplexed as to how they ended up in such an unfortunate state. In any case, budding geologists may appreciate the generally stoic meteorites.
The most impressive section is the Palaeontology Hall and its array of co…
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Victims of Political Persecution Memorial Museum
The little-known Victims of Political Persecution Memorial Museum consists of a series of haunting displays chronicling the bloody communist purges of the 1930s - an aggressive campaign to eliminate 'counter-revolutionaries'. During the campaign, intellectuals were arrested and put on trial, sent to Siberian labour camps or shot. Mongolia lost top writers, scientists and thinkers. One hall reveals this tragedy most vividly with a display of human skulls pierced with bullet holes.
The museum was inspired by the deeds of former prime minister P Genden, who was executed in Moscow by the Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti (KGB; Committee for State Security) in 1937 for refu…
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Museum
Baruun-Urt's surprisingly good Museum has a fine collection of costumes representing the three ethnic groups that inhabit the region: the majority Khalkh, Dariganga (30,000 live in the south of Sükhbaatar aimag) and Uzemchin (about 2000 live in Dornod aimag and Sükhbaatar aimag). Look out for the brass-studded Uzemchin wrestling jacket. From the square, walk 400m south and turn right. The museum is just past the theatre.
There are also beautiful examples of products from Dariganga's renowned silversmiths and blacksmiths (often these are on loan to museums elsewhere in the world), some stuffed gazelle, a map showing the locations of the 'man' and 'woman' balbal (stone fi…
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Museum of Danzan Ravjaa
Noyon Khutagt Danzan Ravjaa (1803-56), a well-known Mongolian writer, composer, painter and medic, was born about 100km southwest of Sainshand. The museum has a collection of gifts presented to Danzan Ravjaa by Chinese and Tibetan leaders, costumes used in his plays, Buddhist statues presented to him by the 10th Dalai Lama, and some of Ravjaa's paintings. He was also very interested in traditional medicine, so the museum also has a collection of herbs.
In the centre of the museum is a statue of Danzan Ravjaa looming in the darkness. Note the small glass jar in front of the statue, which contains Danzan Ravjaa's bones; the poet's mummified body was burned along with his mo…
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Museum of Arkhangai Aimag
The Museum of Arkhangai Aimag is one of the best in the country. It's housed in the temple complex of Zayain Gegeenii Süm, which was first built in 1586 but expanded in 1679, when it housed five temples and up to 1000 monks. Miraculously, the monastery escaped the Stalinist purges because it was made into a museum.
The main hall concentrates on features of traditional Mongolian lifestyle, with exhibits of costumes, traditional tools, a ger, musical instruments, weaponry and saddles. The displays have some useful English captions. The second hall concentrates on religious icons. The other two rooms of the former main prayer hall are empty, while the last hall focuses on l…
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Ethnography Museum
The Ethnography Museum, next to the City Hall, is housed inside the 18th-century home of the Tsetseg Khaan, a Mongolian prince who governed most of eastern Mongolia during the Manchu reign. One building holds a portrait of the last Tsetseg Khaan, painted in 1923. Other buildings contain ethnic costumes, Mongolian toys and some religious artefacts, such as statues and thangka (scroll paintings). On the museum grounds is a ceremonial ger with delicately carved wood furnishing and ornaments. It's usually locked but you could ask the watchman to let you have a look inside.
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Museum of the West Road Military Unit
The West Road Military Unit was a key force in freeing Mongolia from White Russian rule in 1921, their history is described in the small Museum of the West Road Military Unit, 2.5km south of Bulgan. The building itself dates from 1668 and was used a shop until being transformed into a military post in 1921. Choibalsan and Khatanbaatar Magsarjav both stayed here during Mongolia's military campaigns of the early 20th century.
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Central Province Museum
The chief attraction in Zuunmod is the Central Province Museum, opposite the southeast corner of the park - look for the sign in English. There are exhibits on local history and a section of stuffed animals including an enormous moose. It also has some interesting black-and-white photos of Mandshir Khiid, including the once-regular tsam (lama dances, performed by monks wearing masks during religious ceremonies).
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Aimag Museum & Gallery
The Aimag Museum & Gallery, in the former Government House in the old part of town, is one of the best of its kind outside of Ulaanbaatar. It contains some interesting paintings, fascinating old photos, some Choibalsan memorabilia and a giant bowl, made in 1861, which is large enough to boil mutton for 500 people (the mind boggles, the stomach churns). The aimag map marks the location of the some ruined monasteries.
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Museum of Darkhan-Uul
This museum contains a well-laid-out collection of archaeological findings, traditional clothing, religious artefacts and a few obligatory stuffed animals. Its most valued piece is the original painting of Lenin meeting Sükhbaatar, a classic work of myth-making, painted by B Tsultem in 1953. The museum is upstairs in a building on the northern side of the shopping square, across from the minibus and taxi stand.
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Museum
Given the variety of wildlife in the aimag, stuffed animals are, not surprisingly, the main feature of the Museum . There's a large tusk from a woolly mammoth, but you won't see one of those in the flesh - they haven't inhabited this region for more than 40,000 years. Photographic exhibits of the Tsaatan people are also intriguing. The museum is housed inside the local Drama Theatre on the town square.
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Aimag Museum
The well-appointed Aimag Museum houses plenty of stuffed Gobi animals, and a collection of sea shells and marine fossils (Dornogov was once beneath the sea). There is also an impressive skeleton of a Protoceratops and a dinosaur egg. Upstairs, look out for the wooden breastplate used by a Mongol soldier of the imperial fighting days. Lighting here is poor so bring a torch (flashlight).
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South Gobi Museum
Surprisingly, the South Gobi Museum has little on dinosaurs - just a leg, an arm and a few eggs. (All of the best exhibits are in Ulaanbaatar or in other museums around the world.) There are a few nice paintings, a huge stuffed vulture and a display of scroll paintings and other Buddhist items. The museum is on the main street, on the other side of the park from the pink Drama Theatre.
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Museum of Orkhon Aimag
Opened in 1983 and hidden in a concrete complex on the right side of the Marx mural, the small Museum of Orkhon Aimag includes a few oddities including a model of the copper mine (you can see it in 'day' or 'night') and a model of a modern ger with a TV inside. Look out for the two-headed calf, which hopefully is no indication of what the mine is doing to the local water supply.
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Aimag Museum
The comprehensive Aimag Museum has the usual stuff plus a section on the 16th- century Oirad leader Amarsanaa (the chain-mail jacket is supposedly his). There's a newly built wing dedicated solely to the reign of one-time dictator Yu Tsedenbal (who was born in Uvs), featuring photos of the man with other commie leaders like Fidel Castro and Ho Chi Minh.
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Aimag Museum
The Aimag Museum includes some excellent bronze statues, scroll paintings, some genuine Mongol army chain mail, and an interesting shaman costume and drum. Look out for the 200kg statue of Buddha, which was hidden in a cave during the purges and recovered in 1965. There may be no electricity so bring a torch (flashlight) to see the exhibits.
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Aimag Museum
The renovated Aimag Museum is divided into two main sections: a natural history section and a more interesting ethnography and history section. There's also a collection of priceless thangka (scroll paintings), old flintlock rifles, bronze arrowheads, silver snuffboxes, pipes, and chess sets carved out of ivory.
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Ulaanbaatar City Museum
The Ulaanbaatar City Museum offers a brief but insightful view of Ulaanbaatar's history through old maps and photos. The most interesting item is a huge painting of the capital as it looked in 1912, in which you can clearly make out major landmarks such as Gandan Khiid and the Winter Palace of Bogd Khan.
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International Intellectual Museum
The International Intellectual Museum, also known as the Mongolian Toy Museum, is in a pink building behind the round 'East Centre'. It has a collection of puzzles and games made by local artists. One puzzle requires 56,831 movements to complete, says curator Zandraa Tumen-Ulzii.
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Aimag Museum
Since Övörkhangai lies partly in the forested Khangai region and the Gobi Desert, the Aimag Museum boasts a better-than-average selection of stuffed mountain and desert animals. There are also some fossils and arrows, local artwork and leftovers from Karakorum.
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Aimag Museum
The Aimag Museum, inside the sports stadium in the park, is well laid out and worth a visit. There is a good display on Buddhist art, featuring two lovely statues of Tara, some fine old scroll paintings and tsam (lama dance) masks and costumes.
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History Museum
The History Museum, on the main street, contains a mammoth bone, some fine religious art and a tsam mask, worn during lama dances, made from coral. There is also a fine collection of photographs taken of Uliastai in the early 20th century.
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