Mineralogy, Hamburg

Our inventory

Minerals, meteorites, ores and rocks: Our mineralogical collection comprises around 90,000 objects, making it one of the largest of its kind in Germany. Of particular importance are almost 1,000 extraterrestrial samples, including meteorites from the moon and Mars. The comprehensive reference collections form the basis of geoscientific education and research at the University of Hamburg as well as research at the LIB.

Mineral collection

The Mineralogical Museum holds over half of the approximately 6,100 known minerals for research and teaching. This makes Hamburg's collection one of the most important mineralogical reference collections in Germany, alongside the collections of the universities in Freiberg and Berlin.

Meteorite collection

Thanks to our own search expeditions and scientific work on meteorites, the meteorite collection has grown considerably in recent years. The beginnings of the meteorite collection of the Museum der Natur Hamburg - Mineralogy go back to the year 1863. At that time, the Natural History Museum Hamburg had only one meteorite, the "Siderophyr" from Steinbach (Rittersgrün), Saxony, which was found in 1724.