The National Museum of Natural History (, ''Natsionalen prirodonauchen muzey''), or NMNHS, is a

natural history museum A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history scientific collection, collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, Fungus, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleo ...

in the Bulgarian capital of

Sofia Sofia is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Bulgaria, largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain, in the western part of the country. The city is built west of the Is ...

History

Founded in 1889, it is affiliated with the

Bulgarian Academy of Sciences The Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (abbreviated BAS; , ''Bŭlgarska akademiya na naukite'', abbreviated БАН) is the National Academy of Bulgaria, established in 1869. The Academy, with headquarters in Sofia, is autonomous and consists of a S ...

and is the first and largest museum of this kind on the

Balkans The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...

.https://www.nmnhs.com/history-en.html NMNHS History The Museum's collection includes over 400 stuffed mammals, over 1,200 species of birds, hundreds of thousands of insects and other invertebrates, as well as samples of about one quarter of the world's

minerals In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid substance with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. (2011): M ...

. The museum was founded in 1889 as the Natural History Museum of

Knyaz A , also , ''knjaz'' or (), is a historical Slavs, Slavic title, used both as a royal and noble title in different times. It is usually translated into English language, English as 'prince', 'king' or 'duke', depending on specific historical c ...

Ferdinand of Bulgaria Ferdinand I (Ferdinand Maximilian Karl Leopold Maria; 26 February 1861 – 10 September 1948) was Prince of Bulgaria from 1887 to 1908 and Tsar of Bulgaria from 1908 until his abdication in 1918. Under his rule, Bulgaria entered the First Worl ...

, with various foreign and Bulgarian specialists (e.g.

Ivan Buresh Ivan Yosifov Buresh (; 27 December 1885 – 8 August 1980) was a Bulgarian zoologist and entomologist who has been dubbed "the patriarch of Bulgarian biology". He contributed to entomology, speleology, herpetology, and botany, and wrote over 200 ...

, director from 1913 to 1947) serving as its directors until 1947, when the museum became part of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences' Zoological Institute. The museum became autonomous as a separate institute within the system of BAS in 1974. In 1992, the Asenovgrad Palaeontology Museum, an NMNH branch, was founded in

Asenovgrad Asenovgrad ( ) is a town in central southern Bulgaria, part of Plovdiv Province. It is the largest town in Bulgaria that is not a province center. Previously known as ''Stanimaka'' (; ), it was renamed in 1934 after the 13th-century tsar Ivan A ...

. The museum publishes the monthly

Historia naturalis bulgarica ''Historia naturalis bulgarica'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal, published by the National Museum of Natural History, Sofia, Bulgaria. The journal is being published as of 1989, and as of 2018 is published only electronically. The journa ...

journal.

Departments

* Palaeontology and Mineralogy * Botany * Invertebrates * Vertebrates File:A view of the Paleontology hall at the National Museum of Natural History, Bulgaria.jpg, A view of the

Paleontology Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure ge ...

Hall File:The Cenozoic at the National Museum of Natural History, Bulgaria.jpg, The

Cenozoic The Cenozoic Era ( ; ) is Earth's current geological era, representing the last 66million years of Earth's history. It is characterized by the dominance of mammals, insects, birds and angiosperms (flowering plants). It is the latest of three g ...

Era File:The Quaternary at the NMNH, Bulgaria.jpg, The

Quaternary The Quaternary ( ) is the current and most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS), as well as the current and most recent of the twelve periods of the ...

Period

External links

Official website of the National Museum of Natural History
(in Bulgarian and English)

References

{{authority control Museums in Sofia

Natural History Museum A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history scientific collection, collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, Fungus, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleo ...

Museums established in 1889 Natural history museums in Bulgaria Science museums in Bulgaria Fossil museums in Bulgaria Geology museums in Bulgaria

History

Departments

See also

External links

References