Ethnological department
The Ethnological department systematically works on gathering, classification and processing of items that witness the material and spiritual culture of the ethnic communities on the territory of the municipalities of Sombor, Apatin, Kula and Odžaci. The first items were recorded in 1899 when the members of the Historical society in Sombor dedicated special attention to gathering ethnographic items, being aware that those items were abruptly disappearing from the society. Significant gathering actions were organized in 1907 and 1909, when photo shootings (as well as drawings) were also organized in Šokac and Serbian settlements. In 1936, Đorđe Antić, a pharmacist from Sombor, brought the work on gathering ethnographic items back to life, arranged the collections, purchased for his own money the most valuable specimens of folk costumes and gifted over 350 items to the Museum. The largest part of that wealth disappeared during WWII. After the liberation, the ethnographic collections were transferred to the existing Museum building and mainly enlarged thanks to the work of curators Sofija Dimitrijević and Katarina Osvald–Kupusarević.
Nowadays, the Ethnological department has over 6.500 items classified into collections. Those are the collections of traditional clothing with the collections of shirts, aprons, belts, hats; the collection of textile household items with collections of rugs, bags, towels, tapestries; ceramics and dishes from the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century; household items; crafts; photographs from the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20thcentury; industry; folk music instruments…
