The newly arranged permanent exhibition depicts five centuries of the town's history. It mainly consists of boards presenting important facts from the history of Siedlce. Among many exhibits we can find the coat of arms of the first town's owners as well as illustrations to the excerpts from memoirs by Jan Chryzostom Pasek, who visited the Olędzki family - the town's owners in 1660.
A part of the exhibition is devoted to the development of Siedlce from the 18th to the 20th century and the material traces from that period represented by the oldest town buildings and industrial goods manufactured in Siedlce. Another subject of the exhibition is uncovering secret information about the German V weapons by the Home Army (abbreviated "AK") intelligence service.
The exhibition of the oldest archeological discoveries from the area of Siedlce and its surroundings. The exhibits come from the Older Stone Age, i.e. 10,000 - 8,000 B.C. The display was divided into three sections:
- Tools and weapons from the Stone Age
- When the Sun was God - burial customs in prehistoric times.
- Daily life in the Middle Ages.
The exhibited coins and notes are a cross-sectional documentation of history, starting from prehistoric times, through the Middle Ages, up to the 20th century. The ancient times are represented by Roman denars, which were struck in Rome in the 2nd century A.C. The medieval coins' collection includes Arab coins (dirhems), struck in Tashkent at the end of the 9th century and at the beginning of the 10th century. Coins from the 17th and 18th centuries are greatest in number and are represented by orty (coins struck in the Crown and in the Duchy of Prussia), trojaki and szóstaki (coins in denominations of three and six groshes; 1 zloty equals 100 groshes), tymfy (silver coins in denomination of 1 zloty), groshes and szelągi (silver coins). The 19th- and 20th-century collection includes rubles and copecks (100 copecks equal 1 ruble), German marks and pfennigs as well as Polish coins of different denominations.
The exhibition shows objects that have been used in peasant cottages near Siedlce. All presented exhibits come from the Ethnographic Department's collection. The presented forms of material culture in villages located on the border between Podlasie and Mazovia are supplemented by old publications (19th - 20th cent.) and contemporary photographs.
Special attention should be paid to the prolific evidence of folk religiousness. On the table we can see following devotional articles: small altar - "osóbka" (in the shape of a saint) and "pasyjka" (in the shape of a cross), prayer book, rosary and numerous items that are blessed during annual church holidays - "gromnica" (beeswax candle) - the candle is blessed on February 2 with an aspergilium for use during the year; "błażejka" (beeswax candle) - (On February 3, St. Blaise's day in the Catholic Church, the faithful used to be touched by a priest with two crossed beeswax candles to protect them from diseases); Easter lamb, palm, thorns; small birch branches from an altar and garlands of herbs - blessed on Corpus Christi; "ziele" (garlands of herbs) - blessed on 15 August; kozy prostyńskie (goats from Prostynia) - Prostynia is a village in Podlasie. During the parish fairs in this village (St. Ann's Day and Holy Trinity's Day) parishioners make small and coloured figures of goats from dough. These are later blessed in the church. The ritual is believed to guarantee successful breeding of farm animals.
The exhibition reminds us of the presence of szlachta za¶ciankowa (neighbourhood nobility) near Siedlce. It was a social group which exerted a strong influence on the history and culture of the whole region, towns in particular, around which villages inhabited by "grey nobility" were located. The slightly ironic name "grey nobility" refers to grey, woolen, uncoloured zupans commonly worn by men up to the 19th century. Daughters of grey nobility were prepared at home to become housewives. However, if there was a well-disposed aristocratic family in the neighbourhood, the daughters were invited to keep company with a lady and her daughters. Consequently, young women used to learn good manners and acquire the skills of sewing, embroidering and modern household running.
The second chamber is a name of the room which served as a drawing room in houses of neighbourhood nobility. The house usually consisted of four rooms, i.e. kitchen, bigger room (the second chamber) and two alcoves. Besides, there was a spacious vestibule which spread along the building. All family celebrations, particularly those with participation of guests, took place in the second chamber. Its furnishings were often imported or manufactured by good local carpenters. Symbols of religiousness, patriotism and nobility such as religious pictures, coats of arms, portraits of ancestors and arms were important elements of the room's decor. The selection of decorative items in the second chamber demonstrated the wealth of its owners. Decorated benches standing by the walls, chairs and a robust extensive table waited for guests. Samovar was an important everyday household device which was commonly used to boil water for making tea in the area of the Russian partition. The walls were additionally embellished with various fabrics, occasionally oriental ones - mementoes of Turkish wars, as well as goods of hand manufacture and crafts, which testified to diligence and talents of the housewife.
The exhibition, systematically updated since 2002, is still under construction.
The last section of the exhibition presents items from palace interiors, which were owned by those who had the highest status in social hierarchy - the gentry. The high artistic value of the presented exhibits corresponds with the social rank of their owners. Due to the tightness of the exhibition room we were unable to reconstruct the whole gentry drawing room. We merely present a selection of items that were previously used in similar interiors. They create a mixture of different styles that existed in the 19th century as well as at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
On the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the museum's re-opening after the war, the Art Department decided to present the most interesting exhibits from its own collection. The exhibition includes selected landscape paintings by Ludomir Benedyktowicz, Józef Brodowski, Józef Chlebus, Józef Jarosz, Michalina Krzyżanowska, Maria Podlewska and Stanisław Żukowski. The landscape paintings are accompanied by the works of Konstanty Laszczka and artistic glassware by Henryk Albin Tomaszewski.