The beginnings of the Ethnologisches Museum date back to the Cabinet of Art and Rarities belonging to the Electors of Brandenburg. As early as the 1600s, this collection included not only works of European art but also rare objects from distant parts of the world. The Electors eventually formed the Royal Prussian Art Cabinet from which, in 1829, the "Ethnographic Collection" was created. This collection later moved into the Neues Museum. The Ethnologisches Museum itself was founded in 1873, and in 1886 was moved to a building of its own. Under its first director, Adolf Bastian, acquisitions from throughout the world enlarged the collection.
The museum's original building was destroyed during WWII, and the objects which remained intact were reunited in the museum's former storage building in Dahlem. By 1970, new extensions had been completed which provided facilities not only for the Ethnological Museum but also for the Museums of East Asian and Indian Art.
The museum currently holds around 500,000 objects from ancient and pre-industrial cultures the world over, along with large numbers of sound recordings, documentary photographs, and films. Highlights of the collections include unique relief-carved stelae from Guatemala, gold objects from Central and South America, and a Boat Hall containing a great variety of vessels, including an interactive twin-hulled boat from Tonga.