Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología

Museum in Guatemala City, Guatemala

Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología


Established	30 June 1898
Location	6a. calle 7a. Avenida, Salón No.5 Finca La Aurora Zona 13 Guatemala City, Guatemala
Type	national museum of pre-Columbian art and Mesoamerican archaeology and ethnology
Website	www.munae.gob.gt

The Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología (MUNAE; National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology) is a national museum of Guatemala, dedicated to the conservation of archaeological and ethnological artifacts and research into Guatemala's history and cultural heritage. The museum is located in Guatemala City, at Finca La Aurora.

History and collections

First created by a governmental decree on 30 June 1898, the institution and collections of MUNAE relocated premises several times subsequently, until they were established in its present building in 1946. The museum has some 3000 square meters of exhibition space, and 1500 sq.m. devoted to restorative and research purposes. MUNAE's collections amount to some 20 thousand archaeological artifacts and 5 thousand ethnological items.

In October 2021, an ancient Mayan stele was returned to the museum by a private collector in France. This stele had been stolen from the Piedras Negras site in the 1960s. It reappeared in Paris in 2019 during an auction. Thanks to the joint mobilization of Guatemala, France and UNESCO, the sale was suspended and mediation initiated.^[1] The authorities in Guatemala could prove its provenance, upon which the French owner dropped the intended sale in favour for the artwork's return.^[2]

References

^ UNESCO (2021-10-25). "Emblematic Mayan stela returns to Guatemala". UNESCO. Retrieved 2021-10-29.
^ Harmeet Kaur (2021-10-26). "A private collector is returning a Mayan artifact to Guatemala". CNN. Retrieved 2021-10-29.