The collections' first objects came from Charles Daniel de Meuron's cabinet of natural history donated to the city in 1795.

The cabinet included two hundred ethnographic pieces, originating in Oceania, Asia and Africa (by order of abundance).

Throughout the century, the ethnographic collections grew in size and were moved around multiple times, often lacking sufficient space according to their curators.

[1] In 1902,James-Ferdinand de Pury bequeathed his villa on Saint-Nicolas's hill to the city of Neuchâtel, under condition that it be turned into an ethnographic museum.

Its facade is decorated with a massive 166.5 m2 fresco, Les Conquêtes de l'homme, painted by Hans Erni.

[3] Also in 1986, a building for the Ethnology Institute of the University of Neuchâtel was built and links the Villa de Pury to the Black Box.

[8] The Black Box was also renovated, the collections that occupied the basement were moved to a deposit outside of the MEN freeing the space for exhibitions.

During the year 2023, the stored collections (as well as those of the natural history museum, the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire and of the botanical garden) will join a deposit in Serrières [fr], to the west of Neuchâtel.

It was looking back at the second Swiss scientific mission to Angola carried out between 1932 and 1933 and organized by the curator at the time, Théodore Delachaux.

During his time, exhibitions would vary between scientific missions results, universal themes and presentations of prestigious collections.

[12] After him, the exhibitions under Jacques Hainard asserted the reputation of the MEN as an institution questioning the legitimacy of its own social role as a museum.

[18] From 2020 to 2021 the museum presented the temporary exhibition Le mal du voyage, which invited the audience to question tourist practices.

[19] Since June 2022, the temporary exhibition is L'impossible sauvage, which explores the apparent opposition between the wild and the civilized and the limits of such concepts.

The first, Mirages de l'objectif, is based on photographs of the Wodaabe taken by Henry Brandt [fr] in Niger in 1953 started in 2021.

For its author, the inuksuk represents strength, survival and hope; it creates a link between the Inuit and the people of Neuchâtel.

Jean Gabus [fr], his successor made expeditions to meet the Caribou Inuit west of Hudson Bay, as well as in Africa.