Treasures in the Lahore Museum in Pakistan

“We are similar to a museum. My function is to present old masterpieces in modern frames.” Rudolf Bing, (Austrian musician).

Countries like Pakistan have got huge golden treasures of history and civilization that are already being displayed at different museums. The Mohenjodaro and Harrapa on the bank of the river Indus are considered world's second oldest and largest rich civilizations after the great Egyptian civilization. These civilizations depict a history of verity of things from livings to households, from religions to architectures and many more and are remarkable for there uniqueness.

In addition to the mughal architecture that adorns the city of Lahore; there are a good number of buildings having the beautiful British architecture. These include, but are not limited to, Government College Lahore, General Post Office, Saint Anthony's High School, and among these most prominent, The Lahore Museum.

The Lahore Central Museum

The Lahore Central Museum:

The best Museum in Pakistan, housed in an attractive artistic style, the Lahore Museum was established in 1894 in the historical city of Pakistan, Lahore. It has been regarded as the one of the major museums of South Asia. Lahore Museum, also known as Central Museum, gloriously stands on the famous Shahrah-e-Quaid-e-Azam, previously known as The Mall Road, opposite to 100-year old Allama Iqbal Campus of South Asia's famous Punjab University.

Blended with the elements of old tradition of Mughal architecture, the Museum is conspicuous among all the structures build during the British period on Shahrah-e-Quaid-e-Azam. It is in fact Pakistan's largest museum and holds the country's richest cultural and historical materials. The foundation stone was laid by Prince Albert Victor, Prince of Wales, while the father of famous writer Rudyard Kipling, John Lockwood Kipling, was one of the famous curators of the museum and the novel Kim was set in the vicinity of the Lahore Museum.

The Architecture:

The British during their reign compensated Lahore, by harmoniously combining Mughal, Gothic and Victorian styles of architecture. Victorian heritage is only next to Mughal monuments. The Lahore Museum was built on the same mughal-Gothic style. The lush green Shalimar-like gardens, neatly planted trees and flowers diffusing bright colors and fresh fragrance, a good strong and secure red-brick building, beautiful parabolic tombs depicting Islamic heritage with an artistic work of crafted and paved windows and doors, attracting castle-like balconies, with an enchanting white royal entrance and the historical cannons greetings, all cast a spell on the on goers to stand and see and forces the audience to come and look in side this great architecture piece.

The Main Hall Of Portraits:

On student tickets, I along with my four other friends, at last entered this beautiful building after having a security check. The first thing we saw were large collection of paintings dating back to Mughal, Sikh and British era. These were portraits of the great mughal kings, queens, knights, warriors, ministers and other VIPs at that time with there brief history written under their proud looking pictures.

All these portraits, probably more than hundred of them, were placed beautifully on the pavements on the right and left sides of the main hall of the museum. There was a little darkness in the main hall so these paintings were skilled fully lit, making them more beautiful and attractive. While we were already enchanted by the beauty of Mumtaz Mahal and Noor Jahan after seeing there pictures we suddenly heard a young man smiling and saying, “You are not the first person to whom these ladies have attracted young men like you all by the power of their beauty!” And later we came to know that he was the museum guide with quite a great knowledge about history.

The museum has 20 galleries with items dating from the Stone Age to the 20th century. Walking slowly and briefly explaining he told us how Noor Jahan discovered the secret of rosewater, what were the consequences that led to creation of Taj Mahal and when was this beautiful architecture regarded as The Wonder of the World, how the kings ruled the subcontinent while telling their stories of bravery and courage, what were the traditions at that time, what were the drawbacks that led to decline of the mughal emperors, and many other things that we really enjoyed listening.

The Arms & Artillery:

After listening keenly to the stories of these portraits our guide took us to another interesting section of this historical museum, The Arms and Artillery. Right after entering this war section our first sight rested on the great regal bronze sculpture of Queen Victoria wearing Honiton lace apron, sitting gracefully and watching her admirers. During our guide's presentation on this section I came to know for the first time that the building in which the museum is presently housed was built in 1887 to commemorate Her Majesty Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, while as I wrote before, His Royal Highness Prince Victor in 1890 laid the foundation stone.