National Museum: Landmark on Wenceslas Square
The National Museum, Narodni Museum, in Prague is the oldest and largest museum in the Czech Republic. With 20 million objects, it is also the museum with the largest collection. This majestic building dominating Wenceslas Square was reopened to the public after a lengthy renovation, both inside and out. The opening on 28 October, 2018 coincided with the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Czechoslovak Republic. The Narodni Muzeum occupies two buildings at the top of Wenceslas Square: one in Neo-Renaissance the other in Brutalist style.
National Museum: three permanent exhibitions
1. Miracles of Evolution
2. History of the Twentieth Century
3. Gallery of Minerals
Miracles of Evolution
The star attraction of this permanent exhibit is the skeleton of the fin whale, the second largest animal in the world (the largest is the blue whale). The exhibition includes 1.500 stuffed animals displayed in six rooms. The smallest exhibit is the Varroa mite, only 1 mm. The fin whale, 22.5 meters, is the largest and the most spectacular is the stuffed giant squid of 17 meters. Via video mapping you see ‘live’ animals, which you will encounter as stuffed in the other rooms. The light and sound elements create a unique atmosphere. The exhibition gives a rare insight into the world of invertebrates, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and also mammals.
History of the Twentieth Century
The exhibition charts chronologically the Czech history from the First World War to the accession to the European Union in 2004. The exhibition takes you into the World War I trenches, to various apartments furnished with period furniture and to a fully equipped grocery store. You’ll also take a look at a tailor shop that used to be on Narodni Street in the interwar period. Also on display are everyday objects such as the contraceptive pill, a portable electric Remoska oven and one of the first ice refrigerators.
Gallery of Minerals
The collection of minerals has found a permanent place in the museum again. It is the museum’s oldest collection, comprising a total of 100,000 minerals from around the world, of which 4,000 are on display in the original fully restored display cases. The exhibition showcases several forms of gold, silver, diamonds, and graphite in their raw form. Visitors can see colourful agate, amethyst and antimony as well as large pieces of sparkling crystal.
National Museum: the Exhibition Rooms
The interior of the museum is worth a look: the Pantheon, the gallery and the dome. The crowd puller in the hall is the enormous skeleton of a whale.
Inside, a stately staircase covered with red carpets leads to the pantheon, a large covered space that houses busts and statues of famous Czech scholars and artists. Nationalist murals adorn the walls and depict episodes of Czech history. The painting with the title ‘Comenius in Amsterdam’ is very attractive. An important part of the museum is the library, which has a valuable collection of medieval manuscripts.
National Museum: the Collection
The collection includes mineralogy, petrology and a special collection of precious and semi-precious stones. Very special is the large number of meteorites. before the renovation, the entire second floor was devoted to zoology and paleontology. In the zoology department there was a large number of dusty stuffed animals. In the nineteenth century, these were of great importance because they were one of the few ways the public could see exotic animals. Nowadays, we either go on safari or we watch National Geographic or Animal Planet. The permanent collection is now displayed in a more contemporary way and not all the stuffed animals will find a place again. During the renovation, all objects were inspected one by one. It turned out that a large number of gemstones were fakes, whereas at the time a considerable price was paid for them.
Collection of the former Museum of the Workers’ Movement
After the Velvet Revolution in 1989, no museum wanted objects that were seen as relics of the communist regime. The National Museum refused the collections of dismantled museums such as the Lenin and Gottwald Museums. The Museum of the Workers’ Movement kept all documents and objects. Twenty-five years after the Velvet Revolution, the time was right to transfer the collection to the National Museum.
The National Museum in Prague now holds 700,000 documents and other objects from the Museum of the Workers’ Movement. They show the Czech and Czechoslovakian political, social and cultural history in the second half of the last century. Among the acquisitions are the written capitulation of German troops in Prague on 8 May, 1945, the original letters written by the communist journalist Julius Fučík shortly before his execution by the Nazis, a figure carved from bread by Antonin Zapotocky, a bust of Lenin and the pen used to sign the capitulation in May 1945. Part of this collection will be exhibited in the National Museum on Wenceslas Square.
Largest Museum in the Czech Republic
With a facade of 104 metres wide and an area of 7904 square meters, the National Museum, Narodni Muzeum, is the largest museum in the Czech Republic. Pause at the large fountain before climbing the sweeping staircase. The sculpture group shows an allegorical representation of the Czech lands. Bohemia sits in the centre, with the bearded Elbe and the Vltava by its side. Next to it are Moravia and Silesia. From the platform in front of the museum, the view of Wenceslas Square is breathtaking.
Renovation was Badly Needed
The bullet holes of 1945 and 1968 were still clearly visible in the facade of the museum. After the renovation, these holes were filled, a minor mistake because it was the intention that they remained visible. The construction of Metro line A in 1978 caused the building to subside, which was also corrected after the renovation. The museum collection was on display in a manner that was customary in the nineteenth and early twentieth century; long showcases with extendable drawers and large glass showcases, captions only where absolutely necessary and only in Czech. After the renovation, the National Museum has become much more modern and more attractive to a wider audience.
National Museum is not just one building
The National Museum on Wenceslas Square is just one of the National Museums in Prague. It is the umbrella name for 7 museums
1. National Museum, Wenceslas Square, Nove Mesto
2. New National Museum, Vinohradka 1, Vinohrady
3. National Monument Vitkov, u Patmatniku, Zizkov
4. Musaion, Etnographical museum, Kinskeho zahrada 98, Smichov
5. Lapidarium, Vystaviste 422, Holesovice
6. Naprastek Museum, Betlemske namest 1, Stare Mesto
7. Czech Museum of Music, Karmeliska 4, Mala Strana
8. Bedrich Smetana Museum, Novineho Lavka 1, Nove Mesto
The New National Museum
The New National Museum is next to the Narodni Muzeum in an imposing building, but of a completely different style than the main building. The ground floor is an enormous glass-covered elongated block on which an even larger blocks of concrete and glass. Before being an annex to the National Museum, the new building was home to Radio Free Europe. Before that, during the communist era, it served as the national parliament of Czechoslovakia. The new building was built in the 1930s as the Commodity Exchange. The New National Museum houses temporary exhibitions. An underground passage connects the two museum buildings A film about the history of Wenceslas Square from ancient times to modern times is projected on the walls of the passage.
How to get there
Visitors enter the National Museum through one of two buildings. Your entrance ticket gives access to both buildings.
Address: National Museum / Národní muzeum, Wenceslas Square 68, Nove Mesto
Open: 7 days a week 10.00-18.00
Public Transport: Green line A, metro station Muzeum