The Museum of Ethnology

The Museum of Ethnology is one of the foremost museums of its kind. Founded upon the Anthropological-Ethnographical Department of the Natural History Museum, the museum was initiated in 1928 and has been housed ever since in the Corps de logis of the “Neue Burg”. The museum’s holdings were collected since the early sixteenth century and arrived later in the Imperial-Royal Collections by way of Ambras Castle in Tyrol. It holds more than 200,000 ethnographic objects, 25,000 historical photographs, 136,000 printed works and more than 300 kilometres of film footage on the history, culture and everyday life of mainly non-European peoples. Parallel to the general refurbishment since 2004, special exhibitions have been held again since May 2007 and since 2008 the South and Southeast Asia and the Himalaya countries have been presented in a new light.