A new museum opens in Chernivtsi

Yurii Fedkovych Chernivtsi National University has opened the Museum for Ethnography and Ancient history. The exhibition includes a collection of local archaeological findings, tools, and household items of late 19th – early 20th centuries, a numismatic collection, pysankas, embroidered towels and shirts from different areas of Northern Bukovyna, authentic clothing of oblast’s foothills and mountain regions.

“Some of the exhibits were presented by the Museum of Antiquities of the Chernivtsi National University, the other items we have collected on our own, which is a very difficult process today,” says Ivan Sanduliak, Ph.D. in History, director of the museum. “Even the most remote villages modernize quickly, and antiques are massively lost. Therefore, there is a real quest for those artifacts that survived anywhere. At one of the expeditions we reached a village called Shepit, located almost at the very top of the Carpathians, and the locals told us how the day before they had been visited by a platoon of antiquities hunters from as far as Lviv. Not only had they methodically visited the entire village hut by hut, they had done the same for all the surrounding farms.” Nevertheless, the historians of ChNU managed to find some rarities. Besides those exhibited at the opening of the museum, there are other artifacts not presented due to the need for restoration: an ancient loom, old millstones and more.

According to Petro Fochuk, rector of ChNU, in the framework of an EU-funded project there is a similar museum created at the same time at the University of Suceava in Romania, which is the center of Southern Bukovyna. Thus, the visitors of both museums will have a comprehensive understanding of life and everyday routine of the entire Bukovyna population.