India a country steeped in material, spiritual and intellectual wealth attracted people from all over the world. Fascinated by its wisdom Indophiles William Jones, James Prinsep, Max Mueller devoted their lives decoding the scripts and knowledge of this age old civilisation. William Jones formed the Asiatic Society in 1784 to create an Archive, a learning centre for the development of art and culture pertaining to the socio-cultural activities, entertaining people, disseminating knowledge and preserving the cultural as well as natural heritage of mankind for posterity within the geographical limits of Asia.

The history of the origin and the growth of the Indian Museum is one of the remarkable events towards the development of heritage and culture of India. Founded in 1814 at the cradle of the Asiatic Society of Bengal (at the present building of the Asiatic Society, 1 Park Street, Kolkata), Indian Museum is the earliest and the largest multipurpose Museum not only in the Indian subcontinent but also in the Asia-Pacific region of the world.

The Indian Museum (formerly called Imperial Museum of Calcutta) is a grand museum in Central Kolkata, West Bengal, India. It is the ninth oldest museum in the world and the oldest, as well as the largest museum in Asia, by size of collection. It has rare collections of antiques, armour and ornaments, fossils, skeletons, mummies and Mughal paintings. It was founded by the Asiatic Society of Bengal in Kolkata (Calcutta), India, in 1814. The founder curator was Nathaniel Wallich, a Danish botanist.

It has six sections comprising thirty five galleries of cultural and scientific artefacts namely Indian art, archaeology, anthropology, geology, zoology and economic botany. Many rare and unique specimens, both Indian and trans-Indian, relating to humanities and natural sciences, are preserved and displayed in the galleries of these sections. In particular the art and archaeology sections hold collections of international importance.

The Indian Museum originated from the Asiatic Society of Bengal which was created by Sir William Jones in 1784. The concept of having a museum arose in 1796 from members of the Asiatic Society as a place where man-made and natural objects collected could be kept, cared for and displayed.

On 2 February 1814, Nathaniel Wallich, a Danish botanist, who had been captured in the siege of Serampore but later released, wrote to the council of the Asiatic Society for the formation of a museum out of his own collection and that of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta, volunteering his service as a Curator wherein he proposed five sections—an archaeological, ethnological, a technical section and a geological and zoological one.

Thereafter the First Indian Museum Act was passed in 1866 and the foundation of the Indian Museum at its present site laid in 1867 In 1875 the present building on Chowringee Road, presently Jawaharlal Nehru Road, designed by W L Granville in consultation with Sir Thomas Holland, on Chowringee was completed.