The over a thousand-year history of Gdansk has left its mark on both the shape and character of the city. A merchant mecca, a cultural melting pot, a victim of war, and finally a witness to modern history - the roles of Gdansk have changed many times over the centuries, and its turbulent fate has resulted in a history whose traces are collected in numerous museums and science centres. We invite you to visit them!
Archaeological artefacts
What was discovered in Gdansk? What was life like in the Middle Ages? What were the children playing with? What did the people of Gdansk eat? – we will find answers to these and many other questions in the Archaeological Museum in “Bekitny Baranek”. You will find out what is hidden underground in the former monastery by visiting the Romanesque Cellar. The prehistory of this region, diseases that accompanied people and amber stories can be found in the Naturalists’ House. The icing on the cake when visiting this branch will be a visit to the observation tower.
Blue Lamb photo: Archaeological Museum
Maritime artefacts
The history of maritime heritage based on collections related to shipping, shipbuilding, shipbuilding, fishing, and the old port in Gdansk can be learned in the branches of the National Maritime Museum. One of the symbols of Gdansk is the medieval Crane, and the post-war economy of Soldek, children will love playing with ship models at the Maritime Culture Center, in the summer season you can use the Motlawa ferry to get to the branch in the Granaries on Olowianka Island.
Statek-muzeum Sołdek, fot. Narodowe Muzeum Morskie
The cradle of Solidarity
The content presented in the European Solidarity Center (ECS) and the Health and Safety Hall takes the visitor through post-war history to the contemporary period. At ECS, in seven rooms of the permanent exhibition, we can read information on multimedia screens and read the demands from 1980 on the original Table of 21 Demands.
In the Health and Safety Hall, a historic place where the August Agreements were signed in 1980, we will see a table, a model of a shipyard, docks, gantries and cranes, and ship models. These two permanent exhibitions are presented near Solidarity Square, the Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers and the Shipyard Gate No. 2.
War themes
A war-themed visit to Gdansk should include a visit to Westerplatte, the site of the seven-day heroic defence in 1939, Guardhouse No. I, the Polish Post Office Museum and the Museum of World War II.
For connoisseurs
This category includes a visit to the National Museum in the space showing Hans Memling’s work “The Last Judgment”. In this section we can admire paintings by Gdansk and Dutch painters. Objects made of tin, silver and ceramics are presented on the ground floor of the building.
The second place important for the city is the Amber Museum, presenting amber found in nature and works made by humans. Gdansk is called the World Capital of Amber. Another place where we can see amber is the Amber Inclusion Museum.
The Last Judgment, photo © National Museum in Gdańsk
The Amber Museum, The Great Mill, photo by A.Grabowska, mat. MG
Rich people of Gdansk
A tourist can understand how they lived, where they met, where the city council held its meetings, what works of art decorated the houses of Gdansk residents after visiting the branches of the Gdansk Museum.
The representative interior of the Gdansk elite was the Artus Court, where we can see a medieval tiled stove and ship models. The entire decoration is complemented by a pictorial story about virtues, vices, responsibility, war, culminating in the Last Judgment.
The interior of the Main Town Hall with the representative Great Council Hall, Representative Hall, Great Bench Hall, Small Council Hall and the Tiling Room reveal the interiors in which the city authorities used to work.
Uphagen’s house with the preserved layout of the rooms of the former bourgeois tenement house, their decoration and furnishings, shows how the patricians lived.
With history in the background
The Historical Zone Free City of Gdansk is a story about Gdansk and everyday life in the years 1920-1939.
In the summer, an interesting option is a visit to the Wisloujscie Fortress, which guards access to Gdansk from the sea. The fortress served as a former lighthouse and toll collection point.
Remains of a XIXth century military fort with a barracks building and former shelters with interactive exhibitions located in the Hevelianum area.
Science and technology
We will learn how the forge on the stream used to work in the Water Forge in Oliwa in the Ministry of Economy branch. The place that presents clock mechanisms and collections of the Low Lands clocks has an interesting location in the tower of the church of St. Catherine in Gdansk is a branch of the Gdansk Science Museum. The latest offer is a visit to the world of illusions in De Ja Vu.
Water forge, photo: Pomorskie Travel
Ethnography
A museum in the historic Abbot’s Granary, where a collection of furniture and household appliances related to the people of Pomorskie is presented.
For those who have seen it all
When you close your eyes and there is darkness around you, the world does not disappear, only your perception changes. The Invisible Gdansk Museum means learning about everyday objects and city monuments through the senses.
Everyone likes toys, and old toys collected in one place are fun for both adults and children in the Old Toys Gallery. In the Oliwa Park, in the building of the Abbots’ Palace, there is the Department of Contemporary Art in Oliwa, you can see collections of Polish paintings.
