Goa State Museum, state museum in Tiswadi, Goa, India

The Goa State Museum, also called the State Archaeology Museum, occupies the Adil Shah Palace (Old Secretariat) in Panaji. Its fourteen thematic galleries hold about 8,000 objects, among them stone sculptures, wooden saints, bronzes, paintings, manuscripts and coins. The Sculpture Gallery keeps Hindu and Jain pieces from the 4th to 8th centuries, including a Kubera and a Mahishasuramardini from Netravali.

The collection includes a sculpture from the 12th century and a printing press from 1860, representing different layers of the region's past. These objects reveal how artistic and technical knowledge evolved over centuries.

The museum's Christian Art Gallery holds wooden statues of saints and devotional paintings from the Portuguese colonial period, while the Sculpture Gallery shows Hindu and Jain bronzes from the 4th to 8th centuries. The Menezes Braganza Gallery displays portraits of Portuguese governors and prime ministers.

The museum is open to visitors daily and offers different ways to explore the exhibitions. Guided tours for groups help you understand the collections more deeply.

The Contemporary Art Gallery holds a pair of rotary lottery machines made in Lisbon, known as Provedoria lottery machines, with thousands of wooden balls; the first draw is recorded as taking place in 1947. Pictures beside them show how the machines were operated.