The ELTE Museum of Natural History celebrated the 20th anniversary of its exhibitions on the 17th of June 2022. On the occasion of the jubilee, a festive toast was given by university leaders, as well as former and current staff members of the museum.
The ceremony opened with a tour of the cultural treasures in the collections. Some special artefacts were on display, including the skull of Béla Macsói, a prince of the House of Árpád, which was discovered in 1915 during the excavation of the Margaret Monastery on Margaret Island in Budapest. The wounds on his bones suggest that the prince was the victim of a crime of particular cruelty. The 100-year-old rare book of the Mathematics Collection, the collection of mathematical problems for the Matriculation Examination published in 1893, and the Pallasite meteorite from space, which came to our University in 1781 with the mineral collection of Archduchess Maria Theresa's eldest daughter, Archduchess Anna Maria, laid the foundations for our current mineral and rock collection.
The Rector of Eötvös Loránd University, Dr. László Borhy, emphasised the importance of preserving and enriching this unique collection, while expressing his thanks and appreciation for the dedication and exemplary work of the museum staff. Dr. Erzsébet Harman-Tóth, Director of the museum, considers the institution as the leaven of the university community, which is uniquely able to combine the scientific and educational activities of the university.