China Geological Museum is a national AAA tourist attraction. It lies on the southwest of Xisi crossroad, Xicheng District, close to the commercial street in Xidan at the center of Beijing city. It is a modernized comprehensive museum of popular science education for citizens, specimen collection, scientific research, and leisure and sightseeing. Built in 1916 on the site of the mansion Wu Sangui (a general in the early Qing Dynasty) built for his beloved concubine Chen Yuanyuan, it was the first public natural scientific museum set up by Chinese.
The museum covers a floor space of 11,000 square meters, of which 4,500 square meters are exhibition area. It is the largest geological museum in Asia, keeping 200,000 specimens. Following the structure of the earth, it has five halls for basic exhibits——the Earth Hall, Minerals and Rocks Hall, Precious Stones Hall, Prehistoric Creatures Hall, and Land and Resources Hall. The exhibition of rocks, minerals, and precious stones has been designated as one of the 10 best exhibitions in the 6th appraisal of national museums.
The museum has two halls for frequently updated temporary exhibitions on hot topics in geology. Exhibits that have been displayed in them include fossils of such dinosaurs as Shantungosaurus giganteus and Sinosauropteryx; fossils of prehistoric human beings–the Peking Man, the Yuanmou Man, and the Upper Cave Man, etc; fossils of prehistoric fishes, birds, and insects that are valuable both for science and for appreciation; the Crystal King——the largest crystal in the world; the specimen of large crystal clusters of fluorite and those of calcite ; specimens of minerals in large reserves in China——azurite, cinnabar, arsenic sulphide, gamboges, scheelite, and zinckenite; a great deal of precious stones and jade that rank as national treasures; Taihu rocks and conglomerates from the garden of Chen Yuanyuan's house; a rose carved out of natural barite presented by Nixon accompanied by Mao Zedong's inscription; and Zhu De's specimen collection.
Apart from displaying thousands of specimens of minerals, rocks, precious stones, and fossils, exhibitions in the museum are centered on environment and mankind’s quality of life. A rich ambience of science is created with digitalized, bionic, and virtue reality technologies. The museum publishes a magazine named Earth, the only popular science magazine of geology in China. Each year it runs geological summer camps for teenagers and popular science lectures, tour exhibitions, and consultations. The exhibition halls also feature free appraisal service, fossil repair demonstration, and souvenir supermarkets.
Address: No.15 Yangrou Hutong, Xisi, Xicheng District, Beijing |
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