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Musée de géologie Pierre-Vetter

Geology museum in Decazeville dedicated to the fossils of the coal basin and the history of coal; currently closed to the public.

Midlertidigt lukket

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Musée de géologie Pierre-VetterMidlertidigt lukket

Midlertidigt lukket. The museum is currently closed to the public (inventory of the collections, pending reconstruction). No reopening date has been announced.

Om museet

The museum presents the geological richness of Decazeville and the region: rocks, minerals and, above all, fossils. Most of the collections were assembled by Pierre Vetter, a geologist and founder of the museum, notably during his career with the Houillères d’Aquitaine. A significant deposit was made in the early 1980s by the Société des lettres, arts et sciences de l’Aveyron: this is the collection assembled in the 19th century by the geologist Adolphe Boisse.

A large part of the fossils was discovered during coal mining. They date from the Carboniferous, around 300 million years ago, and are the remains of a tropical forest from which the coal originated. The museum holds one of the finest collections of fern fossils and other extinct plants, as well as a fossil unique in Europe: the remains of a tree trunk nearly 4 meters high.

The route also traces the history of coal, from its formation to its extraction, notably open-pit mining. Fine 19th-century models are on display, including the model of the entire Decazeville coal basin at a scale of 1/5000, shown at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris.