BAMBERG: The Paleontological Collection at the Museum of Natural History in Bamberg (NKMB)

Abstract

In the nineteenth century, the special focus of the natural history collection at the Museum of Natural History in Bamberg was the field of zoology. It was only at the beginning of the twentieth century, under the direction of museum curator Theodor Schneid, that regional paleontology began to gain importance. Schneid mainly collected White Jurassic (Weißjura) ammonites and left behind a comprehensive collection, which included numerous specimens. From 2004 onwards, the regional focus has been expanding further through our own scientific excavations in the Late Jurassic Plattenkalk of Wattendorf (in Germany’s Upper Franconia). As a result of these excavations numerous new taxa have come into our possession, most notably among the vertebrate animals. Currently, the museum’s paleontological collection includes some 16,000 specimens.

The Museum of Natural History in Bamberg (Naturkunde-Museum Bamberg) and its collections are in the proprietary of the university-related Lyzeumstiftung Bamberg. In 1988 the foundation transferred the technical and scientific supervision to the Bavarian Natural History Collections, an administration of the Free State of Bavaria.