Vilnius – The Old Arsenal

Located in the Old Arsenal building is the city’s archaeological museum, telling the story of the people who lived in this area from 11,000BC until the creation of the permanent settlement of Vilnius in the thirteenth century. It’s not a huge museum, but the building is of historic interest and the collection is well put together.

A burial with grave goods from around the eleventh to twelfth century. It was found near Kretinga, which is to the north west of Lithuania.

Some items relating to the Selionian tribe, who lived until the fifteenth century in what is now south-eastern Latvia and north-eastern Lithuania, before being subsumed into the Germanic culture. The date of the items vary, but most are between the seventh and tenth centuries.

The upstairs of the museum and I was, to my knowledge, the only visitor in the entire museum.

Animal bones turned into various useful implements and weapons.

The remains of a dugout canoe dating to around the sixteenth to seventeenth centuries, located near the former Bishop’s House in Vilnius.

The cannon barrels are from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and they were found cemented into the wall of the arsenal building. The cannonballs are a mixture from the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries.

It didn’t take too long to look around the museum, but it was a worthwhile visit. The staff member at the front desk was helpful and it was certainly a quiet museum to visit, given that there was no-one else there. It usually costs €2, but I got in free with my Vilnius City Card.