Category: Civil Architecture > Museum
District: Lisboa > Lisboa > Belém > Restelo
The National Museum of Ethnology is located in the Restelo area, which is part of the parish of Belém, in Lisbon. It is housed in a building purpose-built for its museological function, inaugurated in 1976, in a relatively quiet part of the Belém area.
This building was later expanded in 2000, adapting to better accommodate the vast collections and the necessary infrastructure for their conservation and study.
This museum houses the most significant ethnographic heritage at a national level. Its collection is notably extensive, comprising hundreds of thousands of pieces representing a vast cultural diversity.
The collections are essentially divided into two main cores. One of them results from the collection work associated with the museum's initial creation and development, focused on cultures from various parts of the world, with particular emphasis on objects from Africa, Asia, and South America. The other core integrates the collection from the former Museum of Popular Art, dedicated to Portuguese popular art and the country's ethnographic traditions.
A visit to the museum allows one to discover the richness of human cultural manifestations, both in distant contexts and in Portugal. The exhibited pieces, which include everyday objects, ceremonial artifacts, musical instruments, costumes, and tools, tell stories of diverse communities and ways of life.
The collections of extra-European origin stand out for their depth, many resulting from anthropological field research that generated very rich associated documentation. The core of Portuguese popular art, in turn, offers an overview of the creative expressions and traditions of the different regions of the country.
The museum building, with its original design by architect António Saragga Seabra, was conceived for the conservation and exhibition of the collections. Its subsequent expansion, carried out by architect Eduardo Trigo de Sousa, optimized the spaces for study and safeguarding functions.
In addition to exhibition areas dedicated to permanent or temporary displays, the museum is known for having vast visible storage areas. This feature allows visitors to peek behind the scenes and understand the enormous scale of the collection that the museum holds and preserves.
The National Museum of Ethnology is intrinsically linked to the history of anthropology and ethnology in Portugal. Its creation, in the 1960s, and the development of its first collections are associated with the pioneering work of Portuguese researchers who introduced the modern discipline in the country.
The collections are, in many cases, the tangible result of study missions and fieldwork aimed at documenting and understanding cultural diversity, both in the then Portuguese colonies and within the national territory itself. The museum thus functions not only as an exhibition space, but also as a research center and a repository of the study of cultures.
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.pt
Coordinates DD: 38.7049937,-9.2080995
Coordinates DMS: 38°42'18.0"N 09°12'29.2"W
Weather Belém
On-duty Pharmacy Belém
