A world-class collection
The Maritime Museum is located in the oldest and largest museum harbour in the Netherlands, where the port of Rotterdam once began. It was founded in 1873 by Prince Hendrik the Sailor. We are proud of our royal roots and we are particularly grateful to Prince Hendrik for founding the key institute that stores, studies and presents Rotterdam’s maritime heritage to the general public. The collection includes over 850,000 objects from Dutch maritime history from the end of the 15th century through to today. This timespan is something that the objects in other maritime museums in the country are unable to cover. Because of the size and quality of its collection, this museum is one of the best maritime museums in the world.
Building up the collection and stories
The Rotterdam Centre for Modern Maritime History is a collaborative venture between the Maritime Museum and Erasmus University Rotterdam. This research group studies the history of Dutch shipbuilding, the port of Rotterdam and its links with the hinterland and the Dutch offshore industry. These themes are represented both in academic investigations and in the curriculum of the history course at Erasmus University.
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Our masterpieces
Our exhibition ‘Masterpieces’ is showcasing twenty-five unique objects from our centuries-old collection. Each object has earned its place in this exhibition in its own special way – because of its revolutionary role in shipping, because it is a silent witness to a key moment in maritime history, or simply because it is such a high-quality piece.
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