The
Peshawar Museum is a
MuseumA museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...
situated in the historic city of
PeshawarPeshawar is the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the administrative center and central economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan....
, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,
PakistanPakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
.
Introduction
Situated between the old Deans Hotel and the Old city, about five minutes walk from Jail Bridge and the Railway station.
Historical background
The main hall of the museum was built in 1906-07 in memory of Queen Victoria at a cost of Rs 60,000; Rs 45,000 was donated by the public and the rest by the Indian Director General of Archaeology. The Museum was originally called Victoria Memorial Hall and the first Muslim head of the museum was Khan Dilawar Khan Yousafzai.
Layout
The two-story building, an amalgamation of British and Mughal architectural styles, originally consisted of a main hall and two side aisles on the ground and first floor. The side aisles were surmounted by four elegant cupolas and small pinnacles on all corners. Another two halls were added in the eastern and western side of the building in 1969-70. Four years later, a second floor was added to the side halls. In 2004-2005 construction was completed of an Islamic Block with two galleries, a conservation laboratory, two halls for the reserve collection, offices for the provincial directorate of archaeology and a cafeteria. As well as a remodelling of the existing building by replacing the show cases, lighting, labelling and displays in all the galleries of the main building, as well as the revamping of the floor and ceiling.
Collections
The museum currently has 14,101 items in the museum which range from
GandharaGandhāra , is the name of an ancient kingdom , located in northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan. Gandhara was located mainly in the vale of Peshawar, the Potohar plateau and on the Kabul River...
sculptures, coins, manuscripts and copies of the Quran, inscriptions, weapons, dresses, jewellery, Kalash effigies, paintings of the
Mughal eraThe Mughal era is a historic period of the Mughal Empire in South Asia . It ran from the early 15th century to a point in the early 18th century when the Mughal Emperors' power had dwindled...
and later periods, household objects and local and
PersianIran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
handicrafts.
Ethnological section
This section exhibits the culture and life of the major tribes of the NWFP and the Kalasha of Chitral. It presently exhibits 348 items including twelve commemorative effigies of world famous Kalasha figures. Swords, daggers, spears, bows, arrows, shields, muzzle loaded guns, revolvers, pistols and gunpowder boxes are also exhibited.
Gandhara art
Peshawar Museum has the largest collection of
GandharaGandhāra , is the name of an ancient kingdom , located in northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan. Gandhara was located mainly in the vale of Peshawar, the Potohar plateau and on the Kabul River...
Greco-Buddhist artGreco-Buddhist art is the artistic manifestation of Greco-Buddhism, a cultural syncretism between the Classical Greek culture and Buddhism, which developed over a period of close to 1000 years in Central Asia, between the conquests of Alexander the Great in the 4th century BCE, and the Islamic...
in the world. In total, there are 4247 Gandahara pieces including Buddhist stone sculptures and panels, stucco sculptures, terracotta figurines, relic caskets and toiletry objects. The subject matter of Gandhara Art in the main hall includes
BuddhaSiddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...
's life stories, miracles, worship of symbols, relic caskets and individual standing Buddha sculptures.
Islamic art
The gallery exhibits wooden façades of mosques, Arabic and Persian inscriptions, Multani tiles and ceramics, and the dresses and weapons of Syed Ahmad Shaheed Barailvi. Some of the best works are the Islamic metal artefacts in bronze and silver and calligraphic specimens as well as scrolls from as far back as 1224.
Numismatics
The Peshawar Museum has total collection 8,625 coins, 4,510 of which are pre-Islamic. The main interest of the museums numismatic collection is that the coins were recovered from archaeological sites, including: Shah-Ji-Ki-Dheri, Shari Bahlol, Takht-i-Bahi, and Jamal Garhi. The collections of Bactrian Greek, Indo-Greek, Indo-Scythian, Indo-Parthian, and Kushan coins have been published