Armavir Museum of Local History

It was founded in the autumn of 1904 as a museum of visual aids "Society for the Care of Children", headed by the public and political figure of Kuban V.I. Lunin. The museum had about a hundred exhibits and was located in one of the rooms of the Armavir women's gymnasium. Gradually expanding, the museum changed its address several times and finally settled in the Pushkin School (in modern R. Luxemburg Street).

In 1911, it changed its name to Armavir Museum of Scientific and Applied Knowledge in Memory of February 19, 1861. In 1920, the museum was taken for state maintenance, in 1928 it received a beautiful building on the corner of Lenin and K. Marx Street. There were 3 departments: local studies, labor and Sanprosvet.

In August 1942, during a raid by fascist aviation, the museum was destroyed, the funds were completely destroyed. In 1948, the museum was temporarily granted a surviving mansion on the street. Lenina, 114, where he remains to this day. In November 1949, it reopened its doors to visitors. All the exhibits that make up the main and auxiliary funds are collected by the post-war team of the museum.

The museum contains a collection of paleontological finds, including the bones of a mastodon, rhinoceros, saber-toothed tiger hipparion and representatives of fossil marine fauna. Among them is a huge skull (with tusks) of a Trogonterium elephant that lived in the Kuban 250 thousand years ago. Archaeological collections from expeditions that have been held in the Middle Kuban since 1967 are kept. Among them are a collection of gold jewelry III thousand BC (Maikop and North Caucasus cultures), V century BC (Scythian culture), II century BC - II century AD (meots and Sarmats), VII century AD (alanas). A unique collection of Scythian (3 pieces) and Polovtsian (19 pieces) stone sculptures is collected. Basically, they are found in the vicinity of the farm Gorky Balka, several stone statues brought from the village Prochnookopskaya. The statues are male and female, made of gray sandstone and yellow shell. In the collection there is a monument of Cimmerian culture - "deer stone". A collection of black-laced and red-laced ceramics and terracotta figurines is collected.

The decoration of the museum fund is a collection of domestic and foreign weapons of the XVIII - XX centuries. It includes weapons of the period of the Caucasian War of the XVIII - XIX centuries (daggers, checkers, flint and capsule guns and pistols), as well as civil (1917 - 1920) and the Great Patriotic War (small, cold combat and ceremonial weapons).

The museum funds have collections: samovars, mainly Tula production, furniture of the XIX - early XX centuries, "Kuznetsov" porcelain, ethnographic collection, including household items of Circassians, Russians, Adygeans, Germans and other nationalities living in Armavir.

The collection of fine art objects includes three sketches by the outstanding Russian artist M.V. Nesterov: "Seascape", "View of the ship", "View of the mansion", written in Armavir.

Of interest is the collection of icons of the XIX - early XX centuries. Since the beginning of the III millennium, special attention has been paid to completing the collection of Orthodox icons with images of Kuban folk letters. They traditionally differ in color and style from the icons representing the artistic traditions of the middle strip of Russia and its North. Among them are the Trinity, the Lord Almighty, the Protector, and others.

The collections of the museum contain a small but interesting collection of ancient Russian old printed and handwritten books, pre-revolutionary editions of magazines, newspapers, books, giving an idea of the development of books and printing.