About Us

National Museums Scotland

National Museums Scotland is the country's national museum service.

Dolly the sheep at the National Museum of Scotland Our wealth of treasures represent more than two centuries of collecting. Collections take in everything from Scottish and classical archaeology to decorative and applied arts; from world cultures and social history to science, technology and the natural world. We also provide advice, expertise and support to the museums' community across Scotland.


 

Our work includes fieldwork and research and often involves collaboration at local, national and international levels. We aim to be a world class museums service that informs, educates and inspires.

We have five museum sites which open to the public each showing different parts of the collections:

In addition, our National Museums Collection Centre is based in Granton, Edinburgh, and houses literally millions of items - from our collection of 1.2 million insects and classic cars to whale skeletons!

Collections, advice and expertise

Our collections are a legacy which we look after on behalf of all Scots. Our challenge is to translate the significance of the millions of objects in our care to a wide audience. For example, our collection of Ancient Egyptian artefacts numbers more than 6,000 and is one of the finest in the world. It includes the only intact royal burial you can see outside Cairo, dating back to around 1550BC.

Down on the farm at the National Museum of Rural Life
We also provide advice and expertise to the museums community across Scotland and close working partnerships both at home and abroad have allowed us to bring compelling and revealing stories to light around the world.


Education and learning

A packed programme of exhibitions and events at our five national museums each year draw in more than one million visitors, with hundreds of thousands more visitors taking part in our learning activities for all ages.

School children from across Scotland have also experienced days of discovery at National Museums Scotland as more than 50,000 school visits are enjoyed every year at each of our sites. We are also committed to delivering a programme of outreach and partnership projects, taking our collections across the country into schools and through special loans to other museums.

Museum on the Move: Egyptians

How we interpret our collections can increase public understanding of human history and the natural environment. Our research framework provides clear focus for unearthing these stories.

Discover more

Why not discover more about us today? Click on the navigation links above to find out more about us: our collections, policies, corporate information, working for us, Freedom of Information requests and contact details.