Museums in Sri Lanka

Museums in Sri Lanka

Museums in Sri Lanka (Sinhala: ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ කෞතුකාගාර ලැයිස්තුව; Tamil: இலங்கையில் உள்ள அருங்காட்சியகங்களின் பட்டியல்) began with the establishment of the first museum in the country, the Colombo Museum , on 1 January 1877 (Embuldeniya & Karunarathna, 2019; Rambukwella, 2014). After that, as a result of the National Museums Ordinance, passed in 1942, more museums were established at  Kandy (1942), Jaffna (1943), Ratnapura (1946), Anuradhapura  [(1947) Rambukwella, 2014]. These museums were further developed or expanded with time and in addition to them, museums with different themes such as history, archaeology, heritage were gradually established all over the country by three main government institutes; namely the Department of National Museums, Department of Archaeological Survey, and the Central Cultural Fund (Rambukwella, 2014). Besides the main museums administered by these institutes, several small museums and private collections are also maintained by different authorities, su…