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Museum map

  • Level one
  • Level three
  • Level five

Level one

  • Animal World
  • Earth in Space
  • Living Lands
  • Patterns of Life
  • Imagine
  • Discoveries
  • Art and Industry
  • Grand Gallery
  • Connect
  • Kingdom of the Scots
Animal World

From frozen ice caps to sweltering deserts, from the deepest oceans to far into the sky and everywhere in between – animals have amazing ways of moving around, eating, having babies, fighting and protecting themselves. Explore the Animal World, and find out how each animal’s body is adapted to its own unique way of life.

Visit Animal World

Earth in Space
Earth in Space

What is out there? Where do we fit into the Universe? People have always been fascinated by what lies beyond our planet. Technology helps us investigate these big questions. Scientists use evidence from Earth and space to understand more about the Universe and the origins of life.

Visit Earth in Space

Living Lands
Living Lands

Landscapes shape us as much as we shape them. They influence what we believe in, what we make and what we own. From the North American arctic to the deserts of Australia, the peoples in this gallery lead contemporary lives, but their traditional values are based on a deep connection to the land – lands mapped, known and even created by their ancestors.

Visit Living Lands

Patterns of Life
Patterns of Life

Patterns of Life explores the dynamic interaction between people and their possessions. Drawing on our collections from Africa, the America, Asia and the Middle East, it exhibits objects across the cultures from these regions used every day or on special occasions. Visiting this gallery you will be able to share similarities and differences in people’s lives around the world.

Visit Patterns of Life

Imagine
Imagine

Imagine a place where you can create your own story, make music with your friends, dress up for a party or bring a dragon to life! Or would you rather build your own fantasy landscape with castles, animals and trees? Find all this and more in Imagine.

Visit Imagine

Discoveries
Discoveries

Discover the legacy of Scots whose ideas, innovations and leadership took them across the world. Innovators and inventors, diplomats, military leaders, adventurers or the celebrities of their time: intriguing objects reveal the stories of their lives and achievements in Scotland and around the world.

Visit Discoveries

Art and Industry
Art and Industry

The development of new technologies and new materials influences the way things are designed and made. This gallery explores applications of the most innovative technologies, materials and methods of manufacture, often combined with traditional skills, from 1850 to the present day.

Visit Art and Industry

Grand Gallery
Grand Gallery

With its soaring pillars and high windows, the light-filled atrium of the Grand Gallery provides a spectacular start to your museum visit. The Gallery will display nine large items that highlight Scotland’s contribution to the world and reflect the vast diversity of our collections.

Visit the Grand Gallery

Connect
Connect

Get hands on uncovering science secrets in our Connect gallery. Explore creativity, discovery and innovation in five fantastic themed areas: space travel, energy and power, genetics, robotics and transport.

Visit Connect

Scotland
Scotland

Welcome to Scotland in history! Kingdom of the Scots takes Scotland from the time when it emerges as a nation through to 1707, and the Union of the Scottish and English parliaments. Go down to Level 0 for Beginnings and Early People, to explore prehistoric Scotland.

Visit Kingdom of the Scots

Level three

  • Animal Senses
  • Restless Earth
  • Performance and Lives
  • Facing the Sea
  • Ancient Egypt
  • Communicate
  • Scotland Transformed
Animal Senses
Animal Senses

Our five senses help us to discover the world around us and communicate with others. Our brains process what we see, hear, feel, taste and smell. All animals have their own ways of sensing, many very different to our own – sharper sight, keener smell, super-sensitive touch or even senses that are completely beyond our experience.

Visit Animal Senses

Restless Earth
Restless Earth

The Earth is a restless planet, continually shifting under our feet. Powerful events deep below the Earth’s crust create volcanoes and earthquakes, throw up mountains and pull continents apart. Extraordinary rocks and minerals are clues to how these huge forces have shaped and changed our planet over billions of years.

Visit Restless Earth

Performance and Lives
Performance and Lives

Music, sound and performance are important to people’s lives all over the world. Through costumes, masks and instruments, this gallery explores how sounds and rhythm are at the centre of ceremonies and performances, from community festivals to sacred rituals.

Visit Performance and Lives

Facing the Sea
Facing the Sea

Facing the Sea is the only gallery in the UK dedicated to the cultures of the South Pacific. It explores how living in this ocean of islands has shaped every aspect of people’s lives.

Visit Facing the Sea

Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt fascinates us. We may think that the Egyptians were obsessed with death, yet they loved life – death was no more than a continuation of life. Displayed throughout this gallery are objects left behind in graves, tombs and temples which help us understand how the ancient Egyptians lived and died.

Visit Ancient Egypt

Communicate!
Communicate!

The Communicate! gallery tells the story of human communication - from jungle drums and smoke signals to morse code and semaphore, telegrams and telephones to mobiles, email and more.

Visit Communicate!

Scotland Transformed
Scotland

In 1707 the parliaments of Scotland and England joined to form the parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Scotland Transformed explores how the country changed in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Visit Scotland Transformed

Level five

  • Adventure Planet
  • Survival
  • Inspired by Nature
  • Artistic Legacies
  • European Styles
  • Shaping our World
  • Traditions in Sculpture
  • Looking East
  • Industry and Empire
Survival
Survival

What makes one animal species thrive and another die out? The ability of a species to adapt to its environment is key to its survival. The processes of evolution and extinction are constantly happening, changing the diversity of life on Earth. What we do to the world around us affects these processes dramatically and threatens the survival of life as we know it.

Visit Survival

Adventure Planet
Adventure Planet

Our planet is an amazing place for adventures – whether it’s uncovering the skeleton of a dinosaur in our 'Dino dig', dressing up to dive to the bottom of the sea or crawling through the roots of a giant oak tree to discover the species living there. What will you discover?

Visit Adventure Planet

Inspired by Nature
Inspired by Nature

Artists and makers have always looked to nature as inspiration for their work. Depicting, imagining or celebrating nature, their works express human concerns, other worlds, or the divine. While nature continues to stimulate artists, contemporary work is often a statement about human impact on the natural world.

Visit Inspired by Nature

Artistic Legacies
Artistic Legacies

Art has always captured and conveyed human spirit, culture and imagination. Artistic Legacies explores a range of artistic traditions from across the world, from antiquity through to the present, illuminating the relationship between these traditions and the work of the contemporary artist.

Visit Artistic Legacies

European Styles
European Styles

Each historical period has its own unique style, created by influential artists and financed by wealthy patrons and collectors. This gallery traces the major changes and influences in European style over 700 years, and showcases the work of some of the most influential artists of their time.

Visit European Styles

Shaping our World
Shaping our World

This gallery looks at the ways in which scientific developments over the past 150 years have revolutionised the way we live. Discover the surprising stories behind technology we take for granted today, and find out how Scottish scientists, inventors and engineers have had a major impact in shaping the modern world.

Visit Shaping our World

Traditions in Sculpture
Traditions in Sculpture

From earliest times sculptors have created works intended to inspire devotion, to tell stories, to commemorate individuals or to capture beauty in a lasting form. These reflect the different traditions of their cultures.

Visit Traditions in Sculpture

Looking East
Looking East

From tiny netsuke to a suit of Samurai armour, superb ceramics to sculpture, exquisite snuff bottles to burial goods, the Looking East gallery displays highlights from National Museums Scotland's rich and diverse collection of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean material.

Visit Looking East

Industry and Empire
Scotland

Follow life in 19th century Scotland as it is shaped by industrial development in Industry and Empire. Head upstairs to Level 6 for Scotland: A Changing Nation to explore the lives of ordinary and extraordinary people living in Scotland in the 20th century.

Visit Industry and Empire

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National Museums Scotland, Scottish Charity, No. SC 011130