Holstebro Museum, Denmark

Holstebro Museum is a modern state-subsidised cultural heritage museum in Western Jutland responsible for archaeological and marine archaeological issues as well as modern history.

Holstebro Museum is the only institution in Denmark which has a special focus on aerial archaeology. From 2009 – 2013 Lis Helles Olesen is responsible for the research project “an aerial view of the past – aerial archaeology in Denmark”. As it looks now we get the money to continue the project until 2017. http//:www.fortidensetfrahimlen.dk

The collections of Holstebro Museum

In Holstebro Museum there are collections from Antiquity, Middle Ages and Modern history.

Moreover the museum contains special collections in these areas:

• Silver Ware from Ringkøbing County from the 18th and the 19th centuries
• Toys from the 19. and 20. centuries especially tin toys.
• Hand weapons from the middle of the 19. century and the 20. century.
• A collection of weapons and other military equipment related to Jyske Dragonregiment of Holstebro
• A collection of weapons and other items related to the German occupation 1940-45.
• Iron founding in Denmark in the 19. and the 20. centuries.
• Tobacco pipes from the 18. – 20. centuries.
• Records of the Local History Archives for the municipality of Holstebro.

Generally about collection items from Antiquity and Modern history

The collection contains the items deposited at the museum from 1917 till now, either as gifts or from collecting and excavating. The policy of collecting has – apart from the many special collections – until now been quite determined by having had to be local items or items interesting for the local area.

The archaeological collection

The archaeological collection mainly consists of artefacts from the Mesolithic era to the end of the Middle Ages, but also a few excavated items of Modern history are part of it. The items are primarily from the museum’s area of responsibility. The archaeological collection consists of some 1600 records, and it is estimated that the collection totals some 100,000 items.

Most of the archaeological exhibition is closed these years. Only some of the Iron Age exhibition and Viking Age can be seen.