From the ancient time, India’s northern east region is known as a major cultural land. This is region is called as Bihar state. This state is center of the very pure and traditional culture. This is a state where you will get to see the perseverance of the actual religious customs and beliefs. The land of the Bihar state is a great land because this is a birthplace of essential and enormous religious personalities such as Mahavir, Buddha and Nanak. The brave emperors such as Ashoka, Chandragupta Maurya and Sher Shah too came from the Bihar state. Bihar state is a big architectural and cultural inheritance; you can see the ancient articles and scriptures, which works as a proof of ancient cultural time, through the oldest museums.
There are few very rich museums in the Bihar state. These museums acts like a perseverance of Bihar’s culture and also the neighboring regions. Bihar state’s museums stand like an essence of the great sociological and cultural value. The few famous museums of Bihar are located on familiar status and these structures are the savers of the numbers of the cultural elements such as sculptures which has been made by the bronze, wood, stone, coins, terracotta objects, fossils, pottery, manuscripts and carpets etc.
As per the archaeologists, dig objects of this museums contains huge importance. The objects of tribes display the special artisanship. Bihar includes museums like Nalanda museum, Vaishali museum, Patna museum, Vikramshila museum and Bodh Gaya museum etc, these museum are very much famous among the tourists, and these heritages are one of the prime attraction of Bihar state.
Despite this, there is also some science museums have been established in Bihar state. Among these science museums, Srikrishna Science Center and Patna Planetarium are the main demanded museums of tourists.
Jalan Museum
- Region: Bihar, capital city Patna
- Houses: Silver carvings & Jade’s collection
- Called As: Quila House
The actual name of the Jalan museum of Bihar is Diwan Bahadur Rakhakrishna Jalan. This one of the famous museum of this state has been situated within the Quila house; this comes in the capital city Patna. This is an oldest museum, which was started during the year of 1919. this heritage contains the various objects such as carpets, fossils, wood sculptures, crystals, pottery, metal objects, ivory, terracotta, Bahadur, beads etc. this historical museum also includes the Chinese porcelain, European furniture and Nepalese instrument of music and few materials of Burmese. Don’t visit this museum on the Saturdays & Sundays and also on the holidays of Government.
Nalanda Museum
- Region: Bihar, Nalanda
- Close Attractive Spots: Nalanda University
- Started In: 1915
- Visiting Timings: Between 10:00am – 05:00pm, Closed on Friday.
Nalanda museum of Bihar state is a very valuable property of this state. Any state or place’s museum is actual wealth of that particular place; because through museums only you can know about the traditional Culture and historical structure. These constructions makes nation proud. Every country of this world always try to store their sources and heritage, through this you can portray the history. India also has many cultural heritages. Nalanda’s university is one very great heritage but it needs preservation and care. Government of India kept all these essential things in mind and decided to build Nalanda museum in 1917. They constructed the Nalanda Archeological museum. Nalanda museum contains the oldest historic, which was founded on the exhume site, this site had been destroyed during the 12th century.
This historical museum contains the ancient collection, which are more than thirteen thousand four hundred sixty three antiques. Among these antiques three hundred forty nine are showcased within the 4 galleries of Nalanda museum. All these historical items were founded within the Nalanda, during the 5th century. This Nalanda University was damaged through the Turkish attackers during the 12th century. Here you will get to see all the historical articles, which belongs to the 12th century. the ancients items which has been founded within the Nalanda contains sculptures made of stucco, stone, terracotta and bronze all these artifacts have been placed in this museum.
The prime gallery of this museum displays the 16 sculptures which includes the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, Trailokya vijay, Varad Buddha, Maitreya, Bhumisparsh figures, Dharmachakra, Nagaraj, Parshvanath and Samantabhadra. This oldest museum is standing on the land of the Bihar state and carrying large numbers of memories of history. The collection of this heritage is very huge, here you will also get to see that on this region Buddhism religion were dominating and also on the surrounding parts, that’s large numbers of the people of Bihar state adapted Dhamma. Within the structure of the Nalanda museum, on the 3rd gallery showcases around 93 examples of bronze sculptures, it also contains the 2 pictures of the Lord Buddha in the helping shape, Loknath, Tara, Padmapani, Prajnaparamita and Bodhisattva etc.
One more Lord Buddha’s sculpture displays the earth touching shape, you can see it only in the Nalanda museum of Bihar. Apart from the pictures of the Lord Buddha, in the museum you will also get to see the pictures of the Indrani, Lord Ganesh, Lord Vishnu, Surya, Kamadeva etc. the images of Brahminical religion you can see below the roof of Nalanda museum. if you want to known about the ancient life of the Bihar, then visit Nalanda museum, where you will get to see all the rare sculptures which were founded in the land of the Bihar state.
Patna Museum
- Region: Patna
- Visiting Times: Tuesday – Sunday, between 10:00am – 04:30pm.
- Major Ownership : Didarganj Yakshi
This is one more famous museum of the Bihar state, Patna museum was started during the year of 1917. The major motto of behind constructing this museum was to make a structure to show the development of history, art tradition and culture of this state. Because this museum has been situated in the capital city of the Bihar state Patna, it got the name Patna museum. This rich heritage has a big perseverance of the historical artifacts, which was founded while the mine of oldest sites and places comes within the Bihar state. this historical museum contains the huge storage of sculptures, made in the Mathura and Gandhara style. All these ancient sculptures belong to period of Kushana. The sculptures of Gandhar style too famous by Greco-Buddhist Art.
These sculptures created by blue schist. The collection of the Patna museum also contains the Lord Buddha’s figures. Apart from the Lord Buddha’s sculptures, there are also many Bodhisattvas statues which you can see within the Patna museum. Here you will also get to see the divine artifact chest of Lord Buddha, it also consists him selves ashes. This heritage also includes the antiques items, which were founded while the mine of the various regions of the one Bihar state. Few of them are pre historic and few antiques are belongs to the early centuries. In the post mining, the archeologist founded numbers of ancient things, which consists few sculptures made of stone, bronzes, historic objects, miniature paintings, terracotta, coins and thangka paintings etc are very essential artifacts to get the information of the development and history of Bihar.
Here you will also get to see few objects which are belongs to the pre history, these oldest items actually creates interest and excitement in the tourists. These items contain Microliths, Palaeoliths and neoliths. All these items were founded from various portion of this cultural state. the common items such as Paleolithic was founded in Madhya Pradesh state’s Bariar, Tamil Nadu state’s Attirampakkam, Uttar Pradesh state’s Lalitpur, now you came to know that Patna museum is so much rich and great in preserving the history of Bihar state. here you are going to see so many things, which you will hardly get to see at any other place. Patna museum too showcases the sculptures, which belongs to the Kushana period. This contains the popular trio belongs to the Nawada district’s Devangarh.
This museum also includes the 3 different idols of the deities like Balarama, Ekanamsa and Vasudeva, these deities have been displayed here. These idols you won’t get to see every easily anywhere else, it is very scarce. Apart from these scarce items, it also has the 3 pictures of the Maitreya, Avalokitesvara and Buddha, the image is in Bhumisparsha shape. All these images were founded in the mining at Vishnupur, comes under the district called Gaya. You will see few frames of door n the shape of Yamuna and Ganges, displays on their sides.
