A forty-million-year-old insect
Wings and hairs intact — preservation no rock fossil gives.
Tiouraren (Y.-C. Tsai) — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Tiouraren (Y.-C. Tsai) — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Niklitov — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Elisabeth from The Netherlands — CC BY 2.0
The old town's Amber Museum is larger, easier to reach, and treats amber as a material, a craft and a trade through history. This is a biology museum about what is inside the amber: the preserved organisms and their scientific classification. If nature and fossils interest you this is the one; if history and craft do, that is.
Yes if they are interested in insects, dinosaurs and the like, because the idea itself grips them: a real animal trapped for millions of years. The microscopes make it hands-on. But the museum is small and academic in tone, so do not expect interaction designed for children.
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A university museum devoted to organisms trapped inside amber, in the biology faculty of the University of Gdańsk. Amber is tree resin fossilised over millions of years, and while it was still sticky insects, spiders and plant fragments became caught in it and were preserved in complete detail. What you see here is an insect forty million years old with its wings and hairs intact — a level of preservation no rock fossil provides. The Baltic region is the source of most of the world's amber and Gdańsk is its historic capital, so the museum sits in its natural place. The collection is scientific rather than commercial: specimens classified biologically and used in research, with microscopes for seeing the detail. That separates it from the amber shops in the old town, which sell jewellery. It is a small specialist museum with limited university hours and may require booking. Check before going.
Wings and hairs intact — preservation no rock fossil gives.
Most of the world's amber comes from here, and Gdańsk is its historic centre.
Biologically classified specimens, unlike the old town's amber shops.
University of Gdańsk, Oliwa district