Natural History Museum of Erfurt, Natural history museum in central Erfurt, Germany
The Natural History Museum of Erfurt sits in the city center and displays exhibits about local forests, fields, geological formations, and regional plants and animals spread across multiple floors. The collections include minerals, fossils, preserved animals, and plant specimens from the surrounding area.
The building started as a warehouse for woad, a dye that was economically important to Erfurt in medieval times. It was later converted into an educational institution dedicated to natural sciences and regional specimens.
The museum displays collections that reflect how local people have understood and interacted with the natural world around Erfurt. The exhibits show which plants and animals belong to the region and how they depend on each other.
The museum is open Tuesday through Sunday and offers a good overview of the region's nature across multiple levels. Visitors should know the building is an older structure, so it helps to allow time to explore the different areas.
An ancient pedunculate oak tree grows through the museum's atrium, letting visitors see its root system on the ground floor and its crown reaching up through the upper levels. This living tree connects multiple floors of the building.
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