We welcome a brand new addition to the museum community – the South African Reserve Bank Museum was officially launched by President Matamela Cyril Ramaphosa on Friday 19 June 2026.
In his speech, the Governor of the Reserve Bank Lesetja Kganyago quoted Enzo Mari: ‘Museums are the lungs of the city – they make it breathe’. Located at the South African Reserve Bank Head Office Campus in central Pretoria, the museum forms part of the broader campus renovation, with its development undertaken by a multidisciplinary team from Library Special Projects. The displays explore South Africa’s economic heritage, from early systems of exchange that predate the modern economy to the establishment of the central bank, the development of currency, and the evolution of the modern South African economy, inviting visitors to reflect on value, money, and heritage across past, present, and future.
The ‘early beginnings’ section focuses on these early systems of exchange, showcasing objects and materials that people carried and traded over long distances within fundamentally different systems of value prior to the modern economy. The displays include artefacts from the KwaZulu-Natal Museum, such as ivory offcuts from the carving of bangles and pendants as well as a fragment of glazed blue pottery from the Persian Gulf region, recovered from the Early Iron Age site of KwaGandaganda (c. 800–950 CE), money cowries from the São Bento shipwreck (1554), silver coins from the Santiago shipwreck (1585), iron ore from the uThukela Valley, izindondo (19th-century brass beads), and an ingxotha (19th-century brass gauntlet).
In an adjacent gallery, Africa’s first central bank, which explores the origins of the cash economy, is displayed one of the masterpieces of the KwaZulu-Natal Museum collection: a pair of engraved cattle-horns depicting imagery from the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879 by an isiZulu-speaking artist from the Newcastle area whose name is unknown to us today.
These objects are displayed alongside items from other institutions, including
Ditsong Museums of South Africa, Iziko Museums of South Africa, the University of Pretoria Museums and the SARB’s own collections – as well as commissioned artworks, interactive games, the 134 year-old Oom Paul minting press (still operational) and other exciting things for visitors to discover.
We thank the South African Reserve Bank for permission to post these preview images of the museum, which will soon open to the public.
Director of the KwaZulu-Natal Museum, Mr Luthando Maphasa looking at some of the items on loan from the KwaZulu-Natal Museum.
Director Mr Maphasa and curator Dr Justine Wintjes of the KZN Museum, in front of the case with the engraved cattle-horns, displayed next to 19th century banknotes and coins.
