Only in Museum #12

There is a town in India- Mammalapuram, mostly referred to by its old name Mahabalipuram. I went to the museum of seashells there. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the collection of seashells from the tiniest to the largest. Didn’t even know that there are that many types. The smallest were like slightly bigger grains of sand.

Same was the case with different types of pearls! Most of us only know the lovely round shining pearl. But here I saw several types of pearls, some odd shaped too which now makes sense considering the fact that the mollusk is not trying to make the perfect pearl for humans but just trying to prevent the foreign particle that has entered its shell from irritating its body, by putting layers of nacre around it.

There was also a museum of minerals and an aquarium there, besides a dinosaur park. So it’s good fun for kids too.

There were some pretty sculptures made of seashells which I am sharing here, as I had missed to get the additional ticket for taking pictures inside the main museum there.

A giant egg made of seashells

Don’t be confused- it’s not Singapore

What is amazing is that the museum was started by a then 53 year old fish merchant Mr. K RajaMohammed, who was mesmerized by the world of seashells since his childhood and collected everything that he could find. And he has no formal education on the subject of Conchology!

So if you ever find yourself in that small town, more famous for its rock cut temples and sculptures, I would recommend to give some time to this museum too.

Would be great if you would join the “Only in Museum” series by posting something you found catching your eye in one of your visits to the museum. Then create a pingback to this post by including the link to my post in yours. You can also give the link to your post in the comments section below. Also, tagging the post with “Only in Museum” and “OiM” would help all readers find these posts easily.

Adding it to the Cellpic Sunday collection.

Also to Terri’s gray and white challenge.

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