The Palatinate Museum of Natural History (german: Pfalzmuseum für Naturkunde – Pollichia-Museum) is a

natural history museum A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more. ...

in the

Anterior Palatinate The Palatinate (german: Pfalz; Palatine German: ''Palz'') is a region of Germany. In the Middle Ages it was known as the Rhenish Palatinate (''Rheinpfalz'') and Lower Palatinate (''Unterpfalz''), which strictly speaking designated only the wes ...

county town of

Bad Dürkheim Bad Dürkheim () is a spa town in the Rhine-Neckar urban agglomeration, and is the seat of the Bad Dürkheim district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Geography Location Bad Dürkheim lies at the edge of Palatinate Forest on the German Wine ...

in the German state of

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

. There is also a branch of the Palatinate museum, the GEOSCOPE Prehistoric Museum (GEOSKOP Urweltmuseum) at Lichtenberg Castle near the West Palatine county town of

Kusel Kusel (; written ''Cusel'' until 1865) is a town in the Kusel (district), Kusel Districts of Germany, district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the Kusel-Altenglan ''Verbandsgemeinde'' and is also the district seat. The well-kno ...

. Both establishments are run by the Palatinate District Association (''Bezirksverband Pfalz''), the town of Bad Dürkheim and the counties of

and

Geography

The Palatinate Museum is located in a former mill, the ''Herzogmühle'' on the Herzogweiher, a reservoir on the River

Isenach The Isenach is a left tributary of the Rhine in the northeastern Palatine region of Rhineland-Palatinate. It is nearly long. Course The Isenach rises in the northern Palatinate Forest, southwest of Carlsberg Hertlingshausen. Its source in ...

in the Bad Dürkheim ward of Grethen.

Exhibitions and education

Since 1981 the museum has exhibited the natural science collection of the Pollichia nature conservation society as well as a permanent exhibition and changing exhibitions with scientific themes. In 2008 there was an expansion: after the renovation of the former mill restaurant and the erection of an extension to the building the new entrance area and rooms for special exhibitions were officially opened on 8 November 2008. The fields of science covered include

astronomy Astronomy () is a natural science that studies astronomical object, celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and chronology of the Universe, evolution. Objects of interest ...

herpetology Herpetology (from Greek ἑρπετόν ''herpetón'', meaning "reptile" or "creeping animal") is the branch of zoology concerned with the study of amphibians (including frogs, toads, salamanders, newts, and caecilians (gymnophiona)) and rept ...

(reptiles),

ornithology Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

and

mineralogy Mineralogy is a subject of geology specializing in the scientific study of the chemistry, crystal structure, and physical (including optical) properties of minerals and mineralized artifacts. Specific studies within mineralogy include the proces ...

. There is a comprehensive range of educational packages for visiting groups and school classes. Next to the museum shop there is a

palaeontological Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (geology), epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes t ...

workshop and geological reference library. Amongst its best known exhibits is the Krähenberg

meteorite A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or Natural satellite, moon. When the ...

which impacted on the

Sickingen Heights The Sickingen Heights (german: Sickinger Höhe) form a landscape in the western part of the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The region was named after the family of imperial knight, Franz von Sickingen (1481–1523), because most of the are ...

in 1869.

Prehistoric museum

In 1998 the GEOSCOPE Prehistoric Museum was opened at Lichtenberg Castle near Kusel. With a floor area of 400 square metres, the museum offers an insight into the

Rotliegendes The Rotliegend, Rotliegend Group or Rotliegendes (german: the underlying red) is a lithostratigraphic unit (a sequence of rock strata) of latest Carboniferous to Guadalupian (middle Permian) age that is found in the subsurface of large areas in wes ...

period about 290 million years ago. At that time the southern and northern continental plates collided in this region, producing the

Variscan mountains The Variscan or Hercynian orogeny was a geologic mountain-building event caused by Late Paleozoic continental collision between Euramerica (Laurussia) and Gondwana to form the supercontinent of Pangaea. Nomenclature The name ''Variscan'', come ...

, and a moist-warm

tropical The tropics are the regions of Earth surrounding the Equator. They are defined in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the Northern Hemisphere at N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere at S. The tropics are also referred to ...

climate prevailed. Another major subject in the exhibition area is

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

in the

North Palatine Uplands The North Palatine Uplands (german: Nordpfälzer Bergland), sometimes shortened to Palatine Uplands (''Pfälzer Bergland''), is a low mountain range and landscape unit in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate and belongs mainly to the Palat ...

with special coverage of the living and working conditions of the miners. Mineral deposits, including

copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...

and mercury-bearing ores, have been mined here from

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language * Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Fo ...

and

Roman times In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...

right up to the start of the 20th century.

External links

Website of the Museum of Natural History

Website of the Prehistoric Museum
{{authority control Natural history museums in Germany Culture of the Palatinate (region) Museums in Rhineland-Palatinate Buildings and structures in Bad Dürkheim (district)