Zoological Museum of the Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences

About museum

The history of the Zoological Museum's collections dates back to that of the country's first museum — the Kunstkamera, founded in 1714. It all began in Moscow, where the natural history collections acquired by Peter I during his 1698 trip to Holland were transferred. Since then they were kept by the Apothecary Chancellery, and were initially housed in the Green Drawing Room of the Summer Palace. Over the following years the collections of A. Seba, H. Gotwald and F. Ruysh were acquired. Today the museum displays systematic collections of all major animal groups, biological collections and dioramas, as well as more than 20,000 exhibits. The most striking exhibit is the mammoth section with the mount of the 'Berezovka mammoth', mummified mammoth calves and remains of soft tissues of animals preserved in permafrost for 20–55 thousand years. Also noteworthy are the collections of Central Asian animals, marsupials, birds-of-paradise, parrots, hummingbirds, birds of prey, snakes, mollusks, corals and insects.