house of the middle-class family Bajić

building of the Brigadirquartier

As early as in the second part of the 19^th century, inhabitants of Sremska Mitrovica considered a founding of the museum necessary for our town. That was the time when many monuments of antique Sirmium were taken away to the numerous other museums, in the first place to Zagreb, Budapest and Wienna. In 1869 explorer, Felix Kanitcz stimulated foundation of the "Sirmium" society. Society’s main duty was to collect old monuments and make preparations for the opening of the Museum.

Ignjat Jung, a permanent commissary of National museum in Zagreb, a person infatuated with Roman antiquities of Sirmium, acquainted the expert public with exquisite findings during 1885 – 1908 period by the way of 200 long letters with the excellent drawings, sketches and plans of Sirmium and Srem. His dedicated work opened the doors for the today’s archaeology in Sremska Mitrovica.

The museum was established in June 1885 on the initiative of the first mayor Ćira Milekić, after the annulment of the Military border in Srem. Unfortunately, no space was provided for the actual museum. However, some Roman stone monuments were put in the open place, in the park.

Activated by the authorities of the province of Vojvodina the Town Museum finally commenced work in November 1946. Branko Vasilić, an enthusiastic architect who greatly helped development of the museum’s activities, was its first director.

First to open was the Museum of church arts in the old Serbian church. In 1948, a permanent exhibition was opened in the house of the middle-class family Bajić, built at the end of the 18th century. The monuments from the park were moved to this building and thus provided the bases for the permanet exhibition . In the same building there are also the department of archaelogy with numismatic collection, natural history collection and the Centre for the research and documentation of Sirmium.

Today, the Museum of Srem exists in two buildings. In 1982 the museum expanded to the former building of the Brigadirquartier (18th century, rebuilt in 19th and 20th century) where departments of history, history of arts and ethnology are situated together with the managment and a rich library and photolaboratory.