Gansu Provincial Museum

Gansu Provincial Museum, located directly across the street from the Friendship Hotel, covering an area of 16.5 acres, is a local comprehensive museum and it has an excellent selection of exhibits relating to Gansu and the Silk Road.

The museum complex can be divided into three separate buildings, which linked by corridors. On the other hand, it is made up of two sections, natural resources section downstairs and historical exhibits upstairs. 75,000 cultural relics are exhibited here. These precious works are in five exhibition halls for visitors to appreciate.

The Hall of Historical Relics exhibits about 1,500 items of unearthed relics, including painted pottery bowls, vessels and agricultural tools, bamboo slips on medication of the Han era and other excavations from the Silk Road of the Han (206BC-220AD) and Tang (618-907) periods. The most famous piece in the collection of Han Dynasty (206BC-220AD) bronzes is the Galloping Horse of Wuwei, which is accompanied by an array of chariots and carriages.

The Hall of Natural Resources exhibits about 1,380 items of real objects and models relating to Gansu's population, nationality, transportation, climate, animals and plants resources, etc.

The Hall of Jiayuguan Murals of Wei and Jin Dynasty (220-420) displays over 60 murals on the tomb bricks. They depicted the daily life of the aristocrats, laboring scenes of the common people, and imperial life. The colorings are still very vivid.

The Hall of the Yellow River Ancient Elephants exhibits a fossil of the Yellow River Xiphodon mammoth. The 4-meter-tall and 8-meter-long fossil is the largest and best-preserved remains of its kind in the world.

The last hall contains revolutionary relics of the Long March, including pictures, documents, and real objects, etc.