Tongliang Museum

　　Situated by the Bachuan River, the Tongliang Museum is the first county-level comprehensive museum established in Chongqing. Approved by the county government in 1998, it was built with an investment of seven million yuan. The museum complex covers an area of seventy thousand square meters and houses four exhibition rooms for cultural relics, as well as storage facilities and security monitoring rooms. Designed and constructed based on the principles of "dignity, elegance, aesthetics, and humanization," it is a modern, intelligent comprehensive building that officially opened to the public in October 2000.

　　The Tongliang Museum permanently displays four exhibition rooms featuring cultural relics with local characteristics. These include the "Tongliang Culture," a Paleolithic culture more than 20,000 years old named by the Chinese Academy of Sciences; the stone statues of ceremonial guards from Ming Dynasty tombs in Tongliang, commonly referred to as the "Little Terracotta Army"; the world-renowned Tongliang Dragon Lanterns; and folk cultural relics rich in daily life charm.

　　In October 2010, with approval from the Chongqing Municipal Bureau of Cultural Relics, the Tongliang Wooden Plaque Museum was established and operates jointly with the Tongliang Museum. A 1,500-square-meter exhibition room was set up in the new library, displaying 100 high-quality wooden plaques, making it a highlight of the county’s cultural development.

　　Thanks to Tongliang’s profound cultural heritage and abundant precious historical remains, the Tongliang Museum boasts exceptional collection resources. It houses over ten thousand historical artifacts and natural specimens, including 110 first-grade relics (sets), 13 second-grade relics (sets), and 434 third-grade relics (sets). These collections represent a vast array of cultural treasures from ancient times to the modern era in Tongliang. The museum's holdings are especially notable for their ancient biological fossil specimens, Ming Dynasty tomb stone carvings and pottery figurines, dragon lanterns, and plaques. Currently, the museum offers five permanent exhibitions: the "Tongliang Culture Exhibition," the "Tongliang Ming Tomb Stone Carving Exhibition," the "Tongliang Folk Culture Exhibition," the "Tongliang Dragon Lantern Culture Exhibition," and the "Tongliang Wooden Plaque Exhibition," all reflecting the rich historical, geographical, and cultural legacy of Tongliang.

　　Since its establishment, the Tongliang Museum has hosted a variety of large-scale exhibitions, including biological science popularization displays, fine arts relic exhibitions, surface cultural relic photo exhibitions, dragon lantern craftsmanship exhibits, and traveling relic exhibitions, attracting a large number of domestic and international visitors. In 1999, it was designated as a Patriotic Education Base for Youth in Tongliang County. In 2000, it was additionally named the "Chongqing Tongliang Dragon Museum." In June 2009, it was rated as a National Third-Class Museum, and in 2012, it was designated as a Science Education Base in Tongliang County. It serves as an important learning hub for social education and the enhancement of civic literacy in the region.