By its nature, the archaeological collection is the fastest growing collection of the Szekler Museum of Ciuc, which today contains about 100,000 objects. The collection of archaeological relics of the Ciuc Basin started in the Roman Catholic Gymnasium of Șumuleu-Ciuc in the 19th century, but it really gained momentum only after the establishment of the institution in the 1950s and 1960s. Unfortunately, the conditions under which the objects were found at that time are completely unknown, and in many cases the exact location is uncertain. Professional archaeological research began at the end of the 1980s, and regular, scientific collection of artefacts only from the turn of the millennium. The collection sufficiently covers the periods of human presence here, although not geographically uniformly and not in sufficient proportion by period. The stone implements from the Palaeolithic period show evidence of settlement starting some 50,000 years ago, while the Neolithic finds indicate the presence of communities with a rich lore and contact with more populated and more distant areas. Some casting samples suggest that the Bronze Age population, which was socially structured, exploited the resources of the area with sufficient technical knowledge, as did the Iron Age, when local iron smelting was practised in the usual settlements and fortified centres. Over the last two decades, the archaeological collection has grown through professional excavations and finds, with an increasing emphasis on the previously neglected sites of the Migration Period and the Middle Ages. Research has revealed an extensive network of Gothic settlements dating from the 3rd to 4th centuries, closely linked to intensive iron smelting. The later centuries are represented by early Slavic finds. The eastern expansion of the Kingdom of Hungary is illustrated by settlement traces and tombs from the 11th and 12th centuries, while the material culture and the network of contacts of the Szekler people in the Middle Ages are made tangible by the increasingly rich assemblages of 13th and 17th century finds. The biggest challenge facing the archaeological collection is the professional registration of the dispersed units.