Leiden - National Museum of Ethnology

(Local Name: Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde) Near the Valk windmill, at Steenstraat 1, is the National Museum of Ethnology (Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde), the oldest of its kind in Europe. Founded in 1837, it was housed in a number of separate buildings all over the town until 1937, when it found a new home in the former University Hospital. Its extensive collections come from all over the world, particularly from Indonesia and Japan. The first Japanese items were collected by F. van Siebold, a doctor who lived and worked in Japan from 1823 to 1829.