China University of Geosciences Yifu Museum 中国地质大学逸夫博物馆

About China University of Geosciences Yifu Museum

China University of Geosciences Yifu Museum (中国地质大学逸夫博物馆) is the geology museum of the university's Wuhan campus, on the south side of the west campus along Lumo Road (鲁磨路) in Hongshan District. It stands near the shore of East Lake (东湖) at the foot of Nanwang Hill (南望山).

The museum traces its roots to the exhibition hall of the Beijing Geological Institute (北京地质学院陈列馆), founded on 7 November 1957 with Professor Su Lianghe (苏良赫) as its first curator. Its first specimens were inherited from the geology departments of Peking University, Tsinghua University and Tianjin (Peiyang) University and from the Tangshan Railway Institute. When the school moved to Wuhan, part of that collection came too; the Wuhan College of Geology museum opened to the public in 1982 and was renamed in 1987. Construction of the present building began in 2001 with money from the Shaw Foundation (邵逸夫基金会) and the Ministry of Education, and on its completion in 2003 the museum took its current name.

The building, with close to 10,000 square metres of floor space, draws on geology, bionics and astronomy in its exterior and won a first prize for outstanding architectural design in Hubei. Inside, a long corridor slices through the main galleries in imitation of a geological fault and rock fissures, a dinosaur hall rises three storeys through the middle of the north block, and an egg-shaped lecture hall forms the southern end. The museum is a national second-grade museum, and in November 2006 the National Tourism Administration rated it a 4A scenic area; the museum describes itself as the first university museum to receive that rating.

Of more than 40,000 geological specimens, over 3,000 are classed as rare pieces, among them dinosaur skeletons of Yangchuanosaurus hepingensis (和平永川龙) and Psittacosaurus (鹦鹉嘴龙). Six permanent halls cover the planet and Earth, the origin and evolution of life, minerals and rocks, gems and jade, mineral resources, and a collection donated by Zhang He (张和). Outside, the campus adds a fossil forest of more than 70 silicified logs about 150 million years old and a rock core drilled from the bedrock of the Three Gorges Dam, set in front of the library.

What to look for

• The three-storey dinosaur hall at the heart of the north exhibition block
• A Mandschurosaurus (满洲龙) fossil 10.5 m long from Jiayin County (嘉荫县), Heilongjiang, acquired in 1984 and dated to about 65 million years ago
• Keichousaurus hui (胡氏贵州龙), a marine reptile from Xingyi (兴义), Guizhou, dated to 230 million years ago
• A Traumatocrinus sea lily (关岭创孔海百合) from Guanling (关岭), Guizhou, a lily-shaped echinoderm of the same age
• A cluster of 23 elongated dinosaur eggs, about 80 million years old, laid out in a radiating pattern
• The fifth-floor gems and jade hall, and malachite specimens from Yangchun (阳春), Guangdong
• The campus fossil forest of more than 70 silicified logs, and the Three Gorges Dam rock core outside the library

Location & getting there

Getting to China University of Geosciences Yifu Museum

• Search for 中国地质大学逸夫博物馆 with 武汉市 and 洪山区.