Meet the mammoth at the museum on Bolshaya Nikitskaya. Moscow State University, Zoological Museum: symbol, exposition, excursion, reviews Building of the Zoological Museum

The zoological museum operating at Moscow State University is considered the oldest and largest in the capital. Here you can get acquainted with the huge diversity of all modern animals living on our planet.

History of creation

Today, the zoological museum existing at Moscow State University is not only the largest in terms of the territory it occupies, but also the richest in terms of the volume of funds after a similar institution of a similar profile operating at the Russian Academy of Sciences. Truly unique specimens and rich scientific collections are collected here. The Zoological Museum of Moscow State University on Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street is one of the ten largest in the world.

In 1755, according to the decree of Elizabeth Petrovna, the Moscow Imperial University was founded. Today it is known as Moscow State University. The Zoological Museum was opened thirty-six years later. However, this does not prevent it from being considered one of the oldest Russian natural science centers.

Its history dates back to 1791. It was at this time that the Natural History Cabinet at Moscow State University was founded. A zoological museum was opened later on its base. Initially, the collection was replenished through private donations. The most significant was the collection from the Semiatichesky office and the P. Demidov museum. Very rare specimens of animals and plants, minerals, coins, etc. were collected here. Unfortunately, almost all museum exhibits of the Imperial University were destroyed during the fire of 1812.

Miraculously, only a few rare shells of mollusks and corals were preserved.

Branch

In the twenties, a zoological collection was separated from the partially restored office. It formed the basic basis of the museum of the same name. The latter was housed in Pashkov’s former house, which was reconstructed into an auditorium building for Moscow State University. The Zoological Museum was organized according to a systematic principle. This, according to the organizers, made it possible to illustrate as comprehensively as possible the entire natural evolution of animals.

Managers

From 1804 to 1832, the organization was headed by G. I. Fisher. He was an outstanding zoologist, a student of K. Linnaeus himself, who wrote the very first scientific works on the Russian fauna. In 1832, the first director of the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University developed a project according to which he proposed organizing the institution entrusted to him according to the model of classical French, English and German analogues. However, his proposal was not accepted.

From 1837 to 1858 The zoological museum was headed by K. F. Roulier. Being the founder of the Russian ecological school, he focused on the domestic fauna and its study. Roulier attached great importance not only to the collection of serial materials on modern animals, but also fossils. Thanks to this concept, by the end of the fifties of the nineteenth century, the museum had accumulated more than sixty-five thousand exhibits.

Professor A.P. Bogdanov, who led it from 1863 to 1896, played an invaluable role in the development of this institution. It was they who divided the existing funds, separated exhibition, scientific and educational ones, and systematized accounting work. In 1866, the exhibition of the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University was open to viewing, and by the end of the nineteenth century, according to statistics, up to eight thousand people visited it annually.

Moving to a new building

At the beginning of the twentieth century, a new building was built especially for the museum, which in those years was headed by Professor A. Tikhomirov. The project was made by academician Bykhovsky. The new building was located on the corner of Dolgorukovsky (formerly Nikitsky) lane and Bolshaya Nikitskaya street. It has remained in its original form to this day, without any structural changes.

In 1911, a new systematic exhibition was opened to the public in the upper hall. In the twenties of the last century, the building on Bolshaya Nikitskaya also housed work premises for employees of the Zoology Research Institute, and since 1930 - some divisions of the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University. The Zoological Museum was also included in its structure.

War years

In July 1941, the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University on Bolshaya Nikitskaya was closed for obvious reasons. Part of his scientific collections was evacuated to Ashgabat, and the rest were placed in the lower hall. Since March 1942, two halls on the second floor were reopened to the public, and after the end of the war, the lower level was also opened. The evacuated funds returned to their native lands in 1943. The fifties of the last century were marked by the liberation of the museum building from the Faculty of Biology.

Halls of the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University

Today, visitors are presented with more than ten thousand exhibits illustrating the enormous diversity of the animal world of our planet. In the spacious halls of the museum, the exhibitions are built systematically, according to evolutionary criteria and the international zoological classification. This allows visitors to easily navigate through the sections of the rich collection. Miniature life forms, for example single-celled organisms, are represented in the museum by dummies.

The hall on the first floor contains most of the exhibits - from insects and shells to higher beings. Presented in the form of original dioramas, the exhibitions give visitors the opportunity to see representatives of the animal world - reptiles, amphibians, mammals, birds, etc. in their natural habitat. One of the rooms displays deep-sea life forms, as well as ocean floor ecosystems.

Top floor

The Zoological Museum of Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov is a three-story building. Its halls are located on the first two. On the second floor there is the “Bone Hall”. It was given this name because it contains the skeletons of many animals belonging to various zoological orders. The upper hall today is completely dedicated to an exhibition telling about the huge variety of mammals and birds. Almost all the objects in this exhibition are stuffed animals, which were made by the best Russian taxidermists working at the end of the nineteenth and throughout the twentieth century. In both halls, exhibits are mainly placed in strict accordance with their systematic positions.

The symbol of the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University is a small animal, the muskrat. It is he who is depicted on the emblem. There is so much interesting in the museum that it is impossible to see everything in one day. One of the most recent exhibits is the hydrothermal vent community. Compared to other sections of the museum, it looks very unusual. The main object of this exhibition is not a specific systematic group, but different animals that together make up a common ecosystem that is “immersed” in the ocean. This is the only earthly system of its kind, which directly owes its existence on a planetary scale to processes occurring in the bowels of the earth.

Exhibits

A small number of stuffed animals are mounted along the central line of the upper hall. There are also thematic displays dedicated to birds - “Hunting with Birds of Falcon”, “Bird Bazaar”, “Birds of the Moscow Region”.

The Zoological Museum of Moscow State University carries out serious work, studying and systematizing knowledge about animals. Of the ten million exhibits available, only eighty percent are on display. Among them there are also unique representatives of the fauna, for example, the heaviest goliath beetle, etc.

The largest and most interesting exhibits of the museum, due to their substantial size, are presented in the lobby. One of them is a stuffed elephant, which lived in the Moscow Zoo in the post-war years. The second exhibit is the skeleton of a rare woolly mammoth - the last species to live on the planet. It has an interesting feature - a trace of a serious fracture of the skull bone. In addition to biological exhibits, the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University has a good collection of paintings by animal artists.

Additional Information

The institution carries out active scientific work. Many famous scientists, including foreign ones, collaborate with the museum. He has a good library, which contains more than two hundred thousand volumes of literature and research related to biological topics. The museum organizes not only excursions for visitors of different ages, but also interactive classes for children from four to fifteen years old. Lessons are conducted according to the type of active communication. The museum constantly hosts themed children's parties: “Bird Day”, “Russian Muskrat”, etc. By the way, the last animal is, as already mentioned, a symbol of the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University.

On weekends there is a scientific terrarium here. The museum contains numerous living reptiles. Visitors are allowed to feed the chameleons, hold an agama, and the terrarium staff will talk about the habits of their charges in a fascinating manner. The cost of a ticket to visit the museum for adults is two hundred, and schoolchildren, students and pensioners need to pay fifty rubles.

There are probably cowardly pilots or cheerful moneylenders. But people have a different idea about their characters. And as a rule, it is justified. It is not entirely clear whether the profession molds a person, or whether the job is liked only by a certain mental make-up, or perhaps both have an effect, but between the work and the character of people, as the poet asserted, “there are subtle powerful connections.”

The beloved and traditional Jules Verne hero, selflessly hunting for butterflies, kind and eccentric, brave and naive, full of all kinds of knowledge, selfless and enthusiastic, gives an accurate idea of ​​the type of taxonomist. The more you get to know people in this profession, the more often it seems that a taxonomist is not just a profession, but also a personality trait, and that one cannot work as a taxonomist, one can only be one.

The contribution of domestic taxonomists to the classification system is enormous. A distinctive feature of the work of our scientists is their collective style. It is difficult to single out anyone personally in the remarkable army of taxonomists, but it is easy to name the institution with which the world fame of Russian zoological taxonomy is associated—ZIN. It became a scientific institute only during the years of Soviet power. Before that, it was simply the Zoological Museum, and even earlier - part of the famous Peter the Great's Kunstkamera. Now they, ancestor and descendant, are located side by side in the most charming part of Vasilyevsky Island, near the rostral columns, from where the Neva ensembles are so picturesquely visible, the beauty of which is impossible to get used to.

Here, to the first house of the University Embankment, two completely different streams of people are drawn in the morning. One, numerous and loud-voiced, spreads across the museum floor. Walking around the skeleton of a giant whale, schoolchildren are frozen in front of the colorful splendor of a collection of tropical butterflies or a stuffed huge anaconda. Another stream, adult and purposeful people, indifferently passing by the museum’s splendor, disappears into the endless corridor of the Zoological Institute. These are scientific workers.

The science of “Systematics” has a very definite smell. A pungent mothball-formalene spirit forever permeated the walls of the zoo corridor, densely lined with cabinets. They house collections that are among the five richest in the world and books.

The second purely external feature of taxonomy is the abundance of old books. Luxurious volumes, in leather and marroquin, with gold embossing and marble edges, make the institutional corridor look like a bibliophile’s study or a museum collection of rarities. The fact is that books on taxonomy do not age. Endlessly updating and expanding, this discipline stores as working material everything useful that was done by its predecessors. Unlike other sciences, classical works are not petrified here, but are themselves raw materials for the next stages. The systematic tree is forever green!

And perhaps the sense of history and continuity is especially deeply realized in the old building of the St. Petersburg Customs House, adapted for the Zoological Museum, precisely because the learned men of the past and today remain rivals in science. From the portraits hanging in the lobby, they closely follow the battles of modern biologists, as if egging them on: “You, today’s people, come on!” Among them is Peter Pallas, curator of the collections of the Kunstkamera, which laid the foundation for the Zoological Museum.

The son of a German and a French woman, Pallas found his real homeland in Russia, where he was invited by Catherine II. Immediately after his arrival, the new member of the academy sets off on a long journey. Exploring the banks of the Volga and Yaik, the slopes of the Ural Mountains and Altai, the brave explorer reaches the Chinese border. Returning back through the Caucasus, Pallas brought to the capital such an amount of materials that it did not take him his entire life to process them. He was the first to describe musk deer, wolverine, sable... New species of birds, reptiles, fish, mollusks, worms, zoophytes became known to European scientists thanks to his works. Rodents alone provided a whole volume's worth of material. The academician publishes “Russian Flora” in two thick volumes and immediately sets about “Russian Fauna”. But zoological work was not the most significant part of his research. Articles on geography, climatology, ethnography are published one after another. Pallas collaborates in the topographic department, is approved as a historiographer by the admiralty boards, and is busy studying the Crimean Peninsula...

The highly experienced Cuvier concluded his word about Pallas as follows: “He always lived like a true scientist, occupied solely with the search for truth, and did not pay much attention to everything else... The more experience you gain, the more convinced you are that this is the only way to preserve both the purity of conscience and calm!"

It can perhaps be argued that genuine scientific interest and selflessness are the professional traits of taxonomists. What makes a person, bent over a binocular, day after day, study the genital organs of countless beetles pinned to a pin? No resounding success or fame is expected.

Overwhelmed with work, Pallas never had time to create the Zoological Museum, and in the basement of the Kunstkamera, destroyed by dampness and moths, the collections collected by the expeditions of Lepekhin and many other explorers perished.

In August 1828, the Academy of Sciences appointed Karl Maksimovich Baer as director of the museum. In his Autobiography, he describes his impressions of this institution as follows:

“The Zoological Museum, located in two large halls in the building of the old Kunstkamera, as it was called, still gave the impression of the former cabinet of curiosities. Huge snakes and other creatures attached to the walls and ceiling seemed to be crawling along them, amazing visitors... My first thought when examining the Kunstkamera was this: remove the zoological collections from here, since the type of ancient institution is too deeply rooted here. I was further strengthened in this idea when I saw that the systematic names of mammals, which were attached to movable stands, were partly mixed up. Having arranged them properly, two days later I found them again in their original places. It was the work of the so-called “keeper” of the museum, a former servant of Pallas, who had some knowledge of taxidermy, but had no idea about zoological taxonomy.”

Two years have passed. Academician Baer, ​​having never created a museum, left St. Petersburg, and now his own collections, collected in the north of Russia, are rotting in the storerooms.

The Zoological Museum was officially opened on July 4, 1832. Its founder and first director was Fedor Fedorovich Brandt. For almost a year he worked on setting up the museum, devoting all his strength and knowledge to it. When the newly appointed director first came to the Kunstkamera, there was obvious progress in the museum business: instead of one caretaker, there were four employees on the staff...

The exhibits of the Kunstkamera provided a lot of useful information. True, there were rarities, for example, a fossil rhinoceros described by Pallas, and a mammoth described by Brandt himself, but there were no completely exotic, but necessary species.

In 1875, when N. M. Przhevalsky processed ornithological material obtained during his first trip to Central Asia, he needed an ordinary sparrow for comparison. It turned out that there is not a single specimen of a sparrow in the collection of the Zoological Museum. I had to specially prepare several sparrows caught in the vicinity of St. Petersburg.

It would be difficult to find a better director for a young museum than Brandt. He was a scientist of boundless erudition. Fedor Fedorovich began his scientific activity as a physician, and quite successfully: he became a doctor of medical and surgical sciences. But then his attention was attracted in turn by botany, anatomy, and zoology. Moreover, he did not change his profession, but expanded the range of his activities. He combined his directorial duties with lecturing on zoology at the Main Pedagogical Institute, a course in anatomy at the Medical-Surgical Academy, inspector work at the Mariinsky Institute and presidential duties at the Russian Entomological Society.

It is quite difficult to outline the range of his interests, since Brandt was a member of over 70 scientific institutions, both Russian and foreign. Three years before his death, when his 50th doctoral anniversary was celebrated, he was presented with a printed list of his scientific works. It took 52 pages. There was a description of the collections collected by F.P. Litke, works on beavers, a monograph on sturgeon fish, works on botany, paleontology, comparative anatomy, philology and, of course, taxonomy.

For almost half a century, until his death, Brand headed the Zoological Museum, replenishing and systematizing its collections.

In the rays of this glory, the modest name of the preparator of the Zoological Museum, Ilya Gavrilovich Voznesensky, undeservedly faded. Sent by Brandt to collect collections in Russian America, he traveled throughout Alaska for almost ten years. Kuril Islands, Kamchatka. Voznesensky was not a pioneer, but the material he collected, as it became clear later, was a genuine discovery of those places where a meticulous and hardworking researcher came. Academician Brandt argued that “there is no zoological work about Eastern Siberia and our former North American colonies in which the name of Voznesensky would not be gratefully mentioned.”

The collections he collected become more valuable year after year. Today, it is referred to not only by zoologists, but also by historians, ethnographers, botanists, anthropologists, geologists, and demographers. One hundred and fifty boxes of ethnographic materials sent to the Academy, about four thousand animals dissected by Voznesensky, new four hundred species discovered by him are a wealth that “exceeds all probability,” as academician A. A. Strauch, who replaced Brandt in his post, wrote.

In the summer, ZIN laboratories are semi-desert: biologists go to the field. Among them are taxonomists who collect materials from their group. Even today, the field sometimes means a difficult journey, but in the past it was quite a dangerous undertaking, and the taxonomist often walked with a net in one hand and a rifle in the other. While collecting a collection for the museum, P.P. Semenov-Tyan-Shansky successfully penetrated into the heart of Asia, but his predecessor Schlagintwein was executed in Kashgar, and Severtsov was captured by the Yuokandans. The work of a taxonomist often turned out to be akin to the work of a geologist, topographer, or hunter.

When the sharp, creaky voice of Grigory Efimovich Grum-Grzhimailo, a famous butterfly specialist, was heard in the endless corridor of the ZIN, zoologists looked up from their binoculars and identification guides and went to listen to stories about Bukhara, the Pamirs or Western China, where he wandered from 1885 to 1890. Famous the traveler bore the playful nickname "European's Leg", since he reached such a wilderness where no explorer had gone before.

The appearance of the quiet and modest Grigory Nikolaevich Potanin, who always came with his small and thin wife Alexandra Viktorovna, a faithful companion on his difficult campaigns, caused no less a stir. She died in her husband's arms during his fourth expedition to China in 1892.

Ivan Dementsvich Chersky was also a long-term employee of the Zoological Museum. Exiled to Siberia for participating in the Polish uprising, he fell in love with this harsh region and devoted his entire life to it. Tall, slender, wearing the same old jacket and worn-out patched boots, this man evoked involuntary respect from everyone both with his courage and enormous knowledge in geology, paleontology and geography, acquired independently.

Perhaps there is a Muse of Systematics, close to her more famous friends. How else can one explain that among the people who devote themselves to this work there are so many artistically gifted individuals? The first work of Karl Baer published in Russia was a cantata in honor of the end of the Patriotic War of 1812. N. Polezhaev translated Heine, played the piano superbly and wrote romances that were popular in his time. Professor of Zoology, Corresponding Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences N. Kholodkovsky is probably better known as a translator of Milton, Byron, and Goethe. His translation of Faust remains unsurpassed. The son of the famous traveler, a long-term employee of the ZIN, who described 800 species and 100 genera, A.P. Semenov-Tyan-Shansky wrote poetry, translated Horace, and published several articles about Pushkin. He used his specialized knowledge to analyze poetic texts, because many masters make botanical mistakes. For example, in Lermontov’s work “the yellowing field is agitated” and the lily of the valley is blooming at the same time. The elder brother of the leading entomologist of ZIN, a major entomologist himself, Alexey. Nikolaevich Kirichenko was a passionate photographer and was fond of archeology and architecture. He took measurements and photographs of the ruins of Termez monuments of the 11th century BC. e. The number of similar examples can easily be increased. One of the directors of ZIN, academician E. N. Pavlovsky, even wrote a special book on this topic, “Poetry, Science and Scientists.”

Every week, a colorful scattering of biological journals is dumped onto the long table of the ZIN library, and researchers rummage through them, looking for the latest publications of their “rivals.”

The profession of taxonomist is one of those that is difficult to part with. Therefore, there have always been many patriarchs in ZIN. Among them we should name a man who devoted his entire life to the institute and died within its walls, ichthyologist Pyotr Yulievich Schmidt. He was called “medium” in contrast to the “big” - academician-paleontologist F.B. Schmidt, very large and deep-voiced, and the “small” - librarian of the Zoological Museum.

Schmidt’s predecessor in the ichthyological department, S. M. Herzenstein, is also a veteran of the institute. His erudition was inexhaustible. Extremely modest, unusually kind, always ready to help everyone who approached him with a question, he was everyone’s favorite. But his appearance was unprepossessing: stooped, with a huge hooked nose. Professor Nikolsky recalls that once, when Herzenstein was excitedly turning over stones on the shore of the White Sea in search of coastal animals, passing fishermen took him for the devil and shouted: “Get lost, evil spirit!”

But perhaps the person who worked the longest for ZIN was Alexander Alexandrovich Stackelberg, who collected and systematized flies for more than sixty years and was the head of the malaria commission. For many years he was the editor of the volumes “Fauna of the USSR” and “Identifiers” published by the institute. Before his eyes, not only the Zoological Museum, but also the entire biological science changed. At the beginning of the century, all the museum’s research staff gathered to “drink tea” during a break. There were about a dozen of them. And all zoologists in the country, according to statistics, there were 406.

Now /1990/ there are more of them in only one ZIN. There are about five thousand zoologists in the Union. And here's what's interesting. Despite such rapid growth, zoologists make up a share of the total number of biological scientists that is ten times smaller than before the revolution. This means that other biological disciplines are developing even more rapidly.

From 1907 to 1971, Alexander Nikolaevich Kirichenko worked at ZIN. Nothing stopped him from fulfilling his quota every day: identifying 80-200 insects. In besieged Leningrad, he remained at the head of ZIN. Kirichenko described 34 new genera and 223 species, one genus and about 30 species were named in his honor. He is the author of about one hundred and thirty scientific works, including fundamental ones - two volumes “Fauna of Russia” and a reference book for all hemipterologists “Identifier of Hemiptera”, which continues the work of Oshanin. Thanks to the efforts of Alexander Nikolaevich, the stock collection of bedbugs in ZIN is the best in the world. What Kirichenko did not do to replenish it! He exchanged insects for stamps, begged diplomatic couriers to collect them in exotic countries, and corresponded with Russian people who, by the will of fate, had been abandoned to different parts of the world. F. G. Dobzhansky collected bedbugs for Kirichenko in North America, A. Ogloblin - in Argentina, G. Olsufiev - in Madagascar. There are still legends about his memory in ZIN...

Chekhovskaya T.P., Shcherbakov R.L. 1990 The Staggering Variety of Life, 64-77

The Moscow Zoo Museum is located in the most beautiful and ancient building on the territory of the zoo. This is a “stone pavilion for ungulates on 2 floors”, built in the late 19th – early 20th centuries. You've seen it exactly: Samson the giraffe lives on the first floor, and on the second floor there is the Museum of the History of the Moscow Zoo. Entrance to the museum is free! There are no animals here, but it is very interesting here!

The hall displays the emblems of zoos around the world, of which there are already more than 10 thousand.

Each zoo has its own memorable emblem, unlike others.

The Museum of the History of the Zoo is a dynamically developing exhibition project of the State Institution “Moscow Zoo”, formed in 2008-2015 as a Visitor Center and then developed into a unique educational museum exhibition.

The desire to show the complex and interesting life of zoos “from the inside” prompted the staff of the Moscow Zoo to create a Visit Center in 2008, the exhibition of which allows you to look at the relationship between humans and wild animals as a continuous process - from hunting and use as food, clothing, housing, temporary detention in primitive pens - before breeding in captivity in order to preserve wild fauna on Earth as a biological and aesthetic value.

In the central hall of the exhibition three main themes are intertwined: the relationship between humans and animals, the creation and functioning of zoos and the history of the Moscow Zoo.

There are four columns in the hall, each of which carries a certain load and tells about what is around it.

The first column tells about ancient civilization, in particular Egypt. It tells about the collection of animals that were created by the ancient Egyptian, Roman and Greek rulers. Animals at that time were used only for food. Later they began to use animal skins for clothing and housing.

Animals were used as helpers for people, such as picking fruit from trees. Animals were used for military purposes, as well as for entertainment - animal fights.

The model of the Colosseum, everything was done according to old books, turned out to be quite difficult to complete

The Age of Discovery gave impetus to the emergence of zoos in our modern sense

The showcase is dedicated to the Moscow Zoo. Photographs of the founders and zoo pavilions are presented. Coins of 10, 20.50 kopecks are on display. In those years, on different days, ticket prices were different. On the day when admission cost 50 kopecks, wealthy people came, they felt more comfortable walking around the zoo.

In the 1890s, buildings appeared that are still on the territory of the zoo - the dovecote building, the museum building

From the archives: facade of the Moscow Zoo Museum building

Another column is dedicated to zoos in Europe, which were visited by the creators of the Moscow Zoo and from what they saw they emphasized something for the creation of our zoo.

The first European zoo opened in 1752 – Vienna Zoo

In 1857, A.P. Bogdanov presented a report to the Acclimatization Committee “On taking measures to establish a zoological garden.” While on a business trip abroad, he, on behalf of the Committee, visited the zoological gardens of London, Paris, Amsterdam, Ghent and Harlem. The study of the structure of zoological gardens in Europe, their layout, the architecture of pavilions, the principles of keeping animals formed the basis for the creation of the Moscow Zoological Garden.

The initiator of the project was Vladimir Vladimirovich Spitsin, and the authors were L.V. Egorova - one of the oldest employees of the zoo, I.L. Kostina, T.E. Baluyan, N.V. Karpov, V.P. Sheveleva, E.Ya. Migunova, T.V. Voronina, N.R. Rubinstein and other zoo employees, as well as the architect N.I. Sokolova, who found imaginative and precise solutions for organizing a very difficult exhibition space, organically connecting the historical, zoological and cultural lines presented in the museum.

The first animals of the zoo are large animals donated by patrons of the arts.
One of the first zoo animals can probably be considered the wallaby kangaroo.
The territory for the zoo had already been chosen, but was not yet organized (there were no buildings or fences). While all this was being done, the animals were placed in the yards of the employees of the acclimatization society, in general, the acclimatization society began to create a zoo. The wallaby kangaroo lived at the home of Professor Usov, one of the creators of the zoo, and slept on his bed. He was a very tame kangaroo.

After the revolution, the zoo had difficult times, there were big problems with food, there was nothing to heat it with. Moscow was cold and starving, and accordingly the zoo also suffered, but survived. There were difficult times for the zoo in the 30s, at that time many were afraid of a car approaching the entrance. Many zoo employees were repressed.

During the war it was a very difficult time for the zoo; by the way, during the Second World War the zoo practically did not close. Maybe there were several days, during the heaviest raids and bombings.
All employees were on duty on the roofs of the zoo's pavilions these days. Many employees lived on the zoo grounds. There was a family named Zakusilo. They lived on the territory of the zoo, during the raid they were both on the roof of the pavilion dropping incendiary bombs. They saw how a bomb hit their house and no one was on duty there; their main concern was to protect the animals.

Two side halls tell only about the Moscow Zoo.

the museum will be interesting for both children and their parents

All exhibitions are decorated with animalistic works

The museum has some biological objects, but only those that the animals themselves have already lost

For example, an elephant lost a tooth, sawed off the horns, and the fur of a musk ox. The museum does not keep stuffed animals.

The main gate of the zoo has become the hallmark of the Moscow Zoo and the Presnya district

The main entrance of the zoo in different years

In the center of the museum there is a large model of the Moscow Zoo.

Schemes of the zoo in different years

The pride of the museum is the poster dated May 22, 1949. It is in the same frame as in 1949

When Yuri Luzhkov came to the zoo for the first time with his little daughter and saw what a deplorable state the zoo was in... he said that we were urgently starting reconstruction. The end of this reconstruction is taking place now.

There are still a lot of interesting things in the museum, of course it’s better to go and see for yourself :)

I would like to say a huge thank you for your efforts in opening the Moscow Zoo Museum - Natalya Ivanovna, the artist who came up with the design of the museum, as well as the author of the exhibition, Irina Kostina

Come with your whole family to the museum and if you like it, write your review about the museum in the book of honored guests

Second half of the 1750s. Foundation of Moscow University with the Department of Natural History (1755); donation to the University by the Demidov family of their family collection of natural history objects - the “Henkel Cabinet” (1757–1759), the establishment on its basis of the Mineral (Natural) Cabinet at the said Department (1759) - the predecessor of the modern Zoological and Mineralogical Museums.

1770 The mineral cabinet is being brought into the system, and its first inventory is being compiled.

1791 Relocation of the Mineralogical (Natural) office from the former Pharmacy House to the new university building on Mokhovaya; from this year it begins to be titled “Cabinet of Natural History”; This year marks the existence of the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University.

1805–1807 Based on donated P.G. Demidov of the collection of natural history at the University established the Demidov Department of Natural History with the transfer of the Cabinet of Natural History to the jurisdiction of its ordinary professor (head); bringing the two main sections of the university collection - the “Imperial Museum” and the “Demidov Museum” - into order, corresponding to the Natural System accepted in Europe; its complete catalog is compiled and published.

1810s Destruction of almost the entire university collection of natural history objects in the Moscow fire (1812); the restoration of this collection anew through numerous donations (1813 onwards); its location is in the restored university building on Mokhovaya on the right corner of Nikitskaya Street. (1818); the new collection is organized not according to the previous “departmental”, but according to a “natural” principle - like the Zoological and Mineralogical cabinets.

Mid-second half of the 1830s. According to the new university Charter, the single Demidov Department and the Museum of Natural History were abolished and divided according to the above “natural” principle into departments of zoology and mineralogy with offices of the same name attached to them (1835), they are assigned to different professors; however, subsequent (up to the 1860s) university annual reports indicate that these offices are departments of the Natural History Museum; moving the collections to the new building of the University on the left side of Nikitskaya Street. (1837).

Late 1840s The zoological and mineralogical collections are separated geographically: this became an important prerequisite for the transformation of the Zoological Cabinet into a full-fledged Zoological Museum.

First half of the 1860s By order of the trustee of the Moscow educational district, almost the entire collection of naturals that makes up the university Museum of Natural History was transferred to the newly created Public Museum (1861); in 1864–1865 collections have been returned. The Zoological Cabinet is fully integrated with the Department of Zoology, a special “staffing division” has been established between them: this strengthened the demarcation of the two sections of the named Museum of Natural History (which had actually ceased its “single” existence) and became the last step towards the transformation of the Zoological Cabinet into an independent Zoological Museum (1870 -e years).

1900s Moving of the Zoo Museum to the newly rebuilt building of the Zoological Building on the right side of Nikitskaya Street, which it shares with the Institute and Museum of Comparative Anatomy (1901–1902). The exhibition halls on the second floor are equipped with specially ordered metal display cases from the Künscherf company (1907–1909). The floor in the Lower Hall was completely rebuilt (1910). The upper hall of the Zoo Museum opens to visitors (1911).

First half of the 1930s. In connection with the reorganization of the entire scientific and educational system of the country, the Zoo Museum is assigned a mainly educational (exhibition) function. Its scientific part (including the management of stock collections) is briefly transferred to the jurisdiction of the Scientific Research Institute of Zoology (NIIZ), whose leadership proposes to distribute the museum collections to other universities, museums and schools (1930). The Museum of Comparative Anatomy (1931) is attached to the Zoo Museum; The Zoo Museum (in its new composition) is transferred from the university subordination to the direct subordination of the Main Science of the People's Commissariat for Education, it receives the name “Moscow Zoological Museum” (1931). From now on, the director of the Zoo Museum is appointed regardless of official position in any of the faculty departments; the administrative and staffing system is changing in it (1932), accounting, storage and exhibition work is being established (1933–1935); the exhibition in the Lower Hall is reorganized and it opens to the public (1932–1933).

First half of the 1940s. In connection with the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, part of the Zoo Museum’s collections was taken to Ashgabat, and part was conserved (1941); some time later they return to Moscow and are placed in their original places; the exhibition halls on the second floor are opened to the public (1942–1943)

Early 1950s Due to the introduction of a new salary system in the scientific and teaching system, almost all of its leading employees are leaving the Zoo Museum. In preparation for the move of most of the faculties of Moscow University to a new complex of buildings on the Lenin Hills, many premises of the Zoo Museum are allocated for various types of services and materials, exhibition halls are closed to the public, and a significant part of the collections is conserved (1951–1952). After the move and the vacancy of the premises, storage and exhibition work returned to normal (1955–1955). The relocation of the Faculty of Biology greatly reduced the possibility of including museum collections in the pedagogical process; For the same reason, the Zoo Museum was deprived of almost its entire scientific library.

Mid-1960s To correct the abnormal situation with the official salaries of Zoo Museum researchers, they are officially “assigned” to specialized departments of the Faculty of Biology. The situation with salaries is improving, employees continue to work within the walls of the Zoo Museum, providing the entire system of replenishment, storage and use of collection funds, but “legally” it is deprived of its scientific and conservation staff.

1970s and 1980s The museum is entering a difficult and long period of major renovation, which began with the failure of the floor of the lower hall (1971). During the renovation, the area occupied by the Museum was significantly expanded (due to the addition of premises previously allocated for residential apartments), the Lower Hall was equipped with new metal display cases, the Zoological Auditorium was reconstructed, many storage facilities were equipped with metal racks and cabinets. During the second half of the 1980s. collections are housed in the old and new premises, exhibition halls are open to the public.

1991 The Zoo Museum has been given the status of a research institution, it is called the “Research Zoological Museum of Moscow State University. M.V. Lomonosov"; Researchers working at the Zoo Museum are once again officially included in its staff.

Early–mid 2010s Scientific and educational activities are significantly intensifying at the Zoo Museum. The zoological auditorium is reorganized into the Biolecture Hall (2006), and the Zoological Museum begins to actively participate in city educational events. New divisions are being established: a terrarium with scientific and educational functions (2010), a sector of scientific and public projects (2010), the Belomorsk branch of the Zoo Museum on the basis of the Belomorsk Biological Station of Moscow State University (2011). Digital technologies are beginning to be actively used in scientific storage and educational work: electronic databases on scientific (including standard) collections are being organized.

Today our turn is the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University. And the emphasis in the topic will not be in terms of the exhibition of this magnificent museum, but as a remarkable architectural object of Old Moscow. The Zoological Museum of Lomonosov Moscow State University has a glorious history. And besides, it was in this museum that Vladimir Ipatievich Persikov, the main character of Mikhail Bulgakov’s science fiction story “Fatal Eggs,” worked. We will not leave history behind - and we will also examine this architectural masterpiece both from Bolshaya Nikitskaya and from the courtyard of Moscow State University.

The Research Zoological Museum of M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University is one of the largest natural history museums in Russia. In terms of the volume of scientific funds, it is among the first ten largest museums in the world of this profile, and ranks second in Russia. Its scientific collections currently include more than 8 million storage units. The annual increase in scientific collections is about 25-30 thousand units. storage The most extensive collections are entomological (about 3 million), mammals (more than 200 thousand) and birds (157 thousand). The modern exhibition includes about 7.5 thousand exhibits: two halls are dedicated to the systematic part, one to the evolutionary-morphological part. More than 150 thousand people visit the museum every year.
02.

The museum was founded in 1791 as a “cabinet of natural history” at the Imperial Moscow University. Back in 1759, a natural science museum was formed at Moscow University, then called the Mineralogical Cabinet. After biological ones appeared among its exhibits, in 1759 a “cabinet of natural history” was created from them.

In 1802, Pavel Grigorievich Demidov, who had his own natural science museum, which included excellent collections compiled in the three kingdoms of nature (including minerals) and an excellent library, expressed a desire to transfer it to Moscow University and previously contributed 100 thousand rubles to the safe treasury, so that the percentage of the donated amount went to the maintenance of the museum and to the salary of that special professor of the newly formed department of natural history, who would become the custodian of the collections.
03.

Specially invited to Moscow in 1803, G.I. Fischer von Waldheim, in 1804, began organizing and describing the university collections and the P.G. Demidova. He completed the first inventory of the collections in 1806-1807.
04.

In the Moscow fire of 1812, the priceless scientific wealth of the museum was almost completely destroyed. Fischer, who remained in Moscow, managed to save only part of the conchological collection (mollusks). Fischer, having transferred all his personal collections and library to the museum, began to attract many naturalists and private collectors to the active acquisition of new funds and concerns about the restoration of the museum, and already in 1814 the revived museum had 6 thousand items of storage. In the inventory of the collections of the restored museum, published by G.I. Fischer in 1822, there were almost 10 thousand items. The zoological and mineralogical collections were finally separated - even territorially. The revived zoological museum was housed in a wing of the new classroom building. By the early 1830s, G.I. Fischer managed to increase the volume of the collection to 25 thousand items. Initially, the collection served primarily educational purposes. Since 1866, the museum has become publicly accessible. The building on Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street was specially built for the museum according to the design of K. M. Bykovsky (in 1892-1902) in the eclectic style. In the 1930s, the museum was included in the Biological Faculty of Moscow State University.
05.

The Zoological Museum consists of two buildings, placed at right angles along Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street and Nikitsky Lane. At the junction at the corner there is a semi-rotunda the height of the first tier with a portal framed by Tuscan semi-columns. The decorative elements use animalistic and plant motifs.
06.

Now, let's take a look into the courtyard of the Zoological Museum and, at the same time, Moscow State University...
07.

Before us is the Institute of Radio Engineering and Electronics.
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On the right is the building of the Institute of Asian and African Countries.
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To the left are the Research Institute and the Department of Normal Physiology.
10.

And this is the building of the Zoological Museum from the courtyard.
11.

The Zoological Institute became the setting for Mikhail Bulgakov’s fantastic story “The Fatal Eggs”. It was here that Professor Persikov invented a certain red ray, which contributed to the rapid development of animal organisms. Reptiles then overran the capital and surrounding areas, and a catastrophe ensued... The story was perceived by contemporaries as a libelous satire on the communist idea: behind Vladimir Ipatievich Persikov the figure of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was seen, and the red beam was a symbol of the socialist revolution in Russia, which was carried out under the slogan of building a better future , but brought terror and dictatorship.