The Museum’s Collections
The funds of the Burilin Ivanovo Museum of Local History comprise more than 780 000 museum items.
The textile collection contains more than 500 000 articles of fabrics, clothes, flags and works of decorative and applied arts. The collection of linen, mixed and cotton fabrics, one of the most significant in Russia, reflects different directions of textile styling from the late 17th century till the present. The collection includes the items made of metal, wood, ceramics, porcelain, ivory and artificial materials, household stuff, cult items of the late 17th – the early 20th century, shaft-bow bells, clocks and seals.
The documentary sources fund contains personal documents from the late 18th century till the present. They tell about the life and work of merchants, distinguished political, military and cultural activists. The section of social and political documents comprises the collection of Emperor’s decrees and letters of grant of the 18th – the early 20th century, the documents characterizing textile industry development, the monuments to the 1905 – 1907 Revolution, printed production of the first years of the Soviet Union and the documents of the period of socialism. The philately section contains stamps and envelopes devoted to the local history.
The biggest part of the numismatic collection is composed of coins. Most of them are Russian coins of the 16th – the 20th centuries. Foreign coins are represented by the antique, Orient and West European coins. The numismatic collection is supplemented with the collections of bonistics and faleristics. The collection of orders, medals and badges represents the reward system of Russia and is devoted to different historical events.
The items kept in the collections of weapons date back to the 16th – the 20th centuries. The collection has a vast geography. The weapons dated back to the 17th – the 19th centuries, Russian side arms of honour, armour and cold arms from the East and the Caucasus, firearms and cold arms of the Emir of Bukhara.
The collection of handwritten books contains the manuscripts in Latin, Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Arabic, Hebrew, Persian; stone medallions with inscriptions in Turkish; Samaritan and Ethiopian parchments; Indian manuscripts on palm leaves; Greek manuscripts on papyrus; manuscripts on birch bark in Russian, Polish and Ukrainian. The Museum has rich collections of West European books: there are 6 incunabula, theological, philosophical, juridical books, books about art and world history, encyclopedias and dictionaries, fiction. The fund keeps more than 200 Slavic books printed in the 16th – the 18th centuries.
The metal items of decorative and applied arts comprise the items of religious cult, weapons, household stuff, jewelries and numismatics.
Visual Arts Fund contains paintings, graphic works, sculptures, items of decorative and applied arts – copper casts, Palekh and Kholuylacquer miniature, Rostov enamel. The fund of Russian painting of the 18th – the early 20th centuries is rich in the works of provincial portray art of well-known and unknown authors. The collection of textile rough sketches is significantly remarkable.
The Museum keeps the collection of daguerreotypes, photographs, negatives, films and audio documents, post-cards. It shows the history of Ivanovo region since 1840 till the present, its everyday life, culture, the revolutionary events, the civil war and the main events of the Soviet period of history.
The archaeological collection comprises the stone, ceramic, ivory, metal and wooden items. They go back to the Mesolithic, the late Stone Age, the Bronze Age, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece and Rome, the Old Russian state and the Middle Ages. The collection in the whole dates back to the 2900 – 2600 B.C. – 1500 A.D.
The “Materials of Natural History” Fund comprises stuffed animals and birds, the botanic collection - herbarium, geological collection, paleontological collection and entomological collection.