La Galigo Museum

South Sulawesi's first museum was the Celebes Museum, founded by the Dutch East Indies government in 1938 in Makassar, then the seat of the Government of Celebes. It first occupied the former residence of Admiral Cornelis Speelman inside Fort Rotterdam, known as Building D, and later spread to Buildings I and M, but it stopped operating during the Japanese occupation. Local cultural figures began reviving it in 1966, and on 1 May 1970 a governor's decree formally established the Museum La Galigo. The Director General of Culture, I.B. Mantra, opened its permanent exhibition building on 24 February 1974, and on 28 May 1979 it became the official provincial museum of South Sulawesi.

The museum takes its name from I La Galigo, the epic cycle of the Bugis people and one of the longest literary works in the world. Since 2001 it has been a technical unit of the provincial culture and tourism office, now combined with the provincial arts centre as the UPT Museum dan Taman Budaya. Its home, Fort Rotterdam, is dated to 1545, when it was built as a stronghold of the Gowa kingdom. After Sultan Hasanuddin signed the Treaty of Bongaya on 18 November 1667 the fort passed to the Dutch East India Company, which rebuilt it and renamed it after Speelman's birthplace. Prince Diponegoro was imprisoned there from 1833 to 1855.

The collection numbers about 4,999 objects: prehistoric tools, archaeological finds, coins, foreign ceramics, relics of the region's kingdoms and weapons from the struggle for independence, together with ethnographic material from the four main peoples of South Sulawesi — the Bugis, Makassar, Mandar and Toraja. Five pieces are singled out as masterpieces: a model of a pinisi sailing ship, the salokoa royal crown of Gowa, a phallus stone, the lontara manuscript Meong Palo'e and the songko pamiring ulaweng ceremonial cap. Displays also cover traditional dress, weapons and manuscripts. The museum's facilities include an auditorium, an audiovisual room, a library and a small souvenir shop.

The museum opens every day from 8 AM to 4 PM according to the Ministry of Culture's registry, and admission is Rp5,000, paid separately from any fort charge. Fort Rotterdam stands on Jalan Ujung Pandang on the waterfront near Losari Beach, about 20 km from Sultan Hasanuddin International Airport. The national tourism portal suggests visiting the fort from about 3:30 PM until closing, so it makes sense to tour the galleries first and then walk the ramparts. The Makassar City Museum, in the old town hall on Jalan Balaikota, is a few hundred metres away.