Leprosy Museum - Bergen City Museum

Founded in the 15th c., St. George's was a hospital for lepers until the middle of the 20th c. The present day buildings date back to the 18th c.

Between 1850 and 1900 Bergen had three hospitals for leprosy patients and the largest concentration of patients in Europe. The city’s oldest leprosy hospital, St. George’s Hospital, is now not only a monument to thousands of personal tragedies, it is also an important arena for the dissemination of Norwegian work and research on leprosy. In many parts of the world leprosy is commonly known as Hansen’s disease, after the Norwegian physician Gerhard Armauer Hansen who discovered the leprosy bacillus in Bergen in 1873.

St. George’s Hospital was probably raised on the grounds of Nonneseter convent in the 1400s. The patients may have received plants for food and medical use from the convent. The herb garden we meet today is from the 1990s. It is open to the public in the museum opening hours.

If you buy a full-price ticket at the first museum, you get 50% discount on the admission fee to all of our other museums throughout the year.

25% group discount for 10 people or more.