Specimens from the natural world: fossils, shells, preserved creatures, minerals, and botanical specimens. The raw materials of wonder.
Human-made marvels: intricate mechanisms, miniatures, automata, instruments of precision. Art married to ingenuity.
Tools of natural philosophy: optical instruments, alchemical apparatus, measurement devices. The equipment of curiosity.
Objects from distant lands: silks, porcelains, carvings, textiles. Evidence of worlds beyond the known horizon.
Marvels and impossibilities: unicorn horns, dragon scales, relics of saints. Things that should not exist but somehow do.
These five categories were traditional in Renaissance Wunderkammern—cabinets of curiosity that preceded the modern museum.