Museum Science and History

  1. The word “museum” literally means Temple or Seat of the Muses. The Muses were the nine goddesses of the ancient Mediterranean World. They were the goddesses of WISDOM and INSPIRATION. Scholars who went to the temple to worship gradually got the idea that if these goddesses inspired wisdom then where better to pursue their academic studies. Gradually through time the temples became places of study rather than worship.
  2. The first museum was also called the ALEXANDRIAN MUSEUM, OR MUSEUM OF ALEXANDRIA, Greek MOUSEION, ancient centre of classical learning at Alexandria in Egypt. A research institute that was especially noted for its scientific and literary scholarship, the Museum was built near the royal palace either by Ptolemy II Philadelphus about 280 BC or by his father Ptolemy I Soter (reigned 323-285/283 BC). The best surviving description of the Museum is by the Greek geographer and historian Strabo, who mentions that it was a large complex of buildings and gardens with richly decorated lecture and banquet halls linked by porticos, or colonnaded walks. It was organized in faculties with a president-priest at the head; the salaries of the scholars on the staff were paid by the Egyptian king and later by the Roman emperor. The renowned Library of Alexandria ormed a part of the Museum. In AD 272 the buildings of the Museum were destroyed in the civil war under the Roman emperor Aurelian, although the educational and research functions of the institution seem to have continued until the 5th century.
  3. The word museum has classical origins. In its Greek form, mouseion, it meant "seat of the Muses" and designated a philosophical institution or a place of contemplation. Use of the Latin derivation, museum, appears to have been restricted in Roman times mainly to places of philosophical discussion.
  4. Thus the great Museum at Alexandria, founded by Ptolemy I Soter early in the 3rd century BC, with its college of scholars and its library, was more a prototype university than an institution to preserve and interpret material aspects of the heritage. The word museum was revived in 15th-century Europe to describe the collection of Lorenzo de' Medici in Florence, but the term conveyed the concept of comprehensiveness rather than denoting a building. By the 17th century museum was being used in Europe to describe collections of curiosities. Ole Worm's collection in Copenhagen was so called, and in England visitors to John Tradescant's collection in Lambeth (now a London borough) called the array there a museum; the catalog of this collection, was published in 1656. Use of the word museum during the 19th and most of the 20th century denoted a building housing cultural material to which the public had access. Later, as museums continued to respond to the societies that created them, the emphasis on the building itself became less dominant. Open-air museums, comprising a series of buildings preserved as objects, and ecomuseums, involving the interpretation of all aspects of an outdoor environment, provide examples of this. In addition, so-called virtual museums exist in electronic form on the Internet. Although virtual museums provide interesting opportunities for and bring certain benefits to existing museums, they remain dependent upon the collection, preservation, and interpretation of material things by the real museum.
  5. In the United States The Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, D.C., came into existence through the remarkable bequest of nearly one-half million dollars from James Smithson, an Englishman. He wished to see established in the United States an institution "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men." In 1846 the U.S. Congress accepted his bequest and passed legislation establishing the Smithsonian as an institution charged with representing "all objects of art and curious research . . . natural history, plants, [and] geological and mineralogical specimens" belonging to the United States. The U.S. National Museum opened in 1858 as part of the Smithsonian's scientific program and formed the first of its many museums, most of which stand along the Mall in Washington, D.C.
  6. Many kinds of museums exist. There even museums for baseball cards. A NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM is a museum where non-man made items are studied. Natural literally means “of nature” and history is generally regarded as “pertaining to the past.” The reality is however that today is really tomorrow’s history. So history really means a study of the past, present, and future. Thus a natural history museum is a place where the “past, present, and future” of non-man made things are studied.
  7. Museums of all types have three major functions: TO EDUCATE THE PUBLIC, TO ARCHIVE AND PRESERVE SPECIMENS, AND TO DO RESEARCH.
  8. Among the largest Natural History Museums in the World are: The British Museum of Natural History, and The Paris Museum of Natural History. In the United States the largest are: The American Museum of Natural History New York, The National Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian, The Field
    Museum Chicago, The Denver Museum of Natural History, and The Natural History Museum of the California Academy of Sciences. Literally hundreds of other fine museums around the World and country also are very well known.
  9. Although small The Amarillo College Natural History Museum is very well known. It attracts thousands of visitors annually and also research scientists from institutions such as the: Smithsonian, Field Museum, Denver Museum, Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum, and the Florida Collection of Arthropods.
  10. The Amarillo College Natural History Museum is blessed to have many benefactors not the least of which are: Jim J. Brewer and Bill Britain of Safari Club International, The safari Club International itself, Richard Howard, Michael Ray Evans of Canyon, Randall Scott Fauske, Nola Ash, and many others.