MUSEUM is derived from a Greek term signifying a temple of the muses, but, as used in Great Britain and in British India, it designates an institution in which are arranged specimens of the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, and those illustrative of economic geology. The pro bability is that there were many students of natural history in ancient times ; for in Pompeii, destroyed in A.D. 79 by lava, in the room of a painter, a large collection of shells was found, comprising a great variety of Mediterranean species, in as good a state of preservation as if they had remained for the same number of years in a museum. We know, moreover, that on the revival of science in Western Europe, after the fall of the Constantinopolitan empire, the princes and nobles formed collections of relics of art, of specimens of natural objects, and other produc tions, constituting cabinets and museums. The discovery of busts, statues, bas-reliefs, inscrip tions, and other antiquities of various kinds, led to the formation of many museums in Italy earlier than in other countries ; the Medici, Dukes of Florence, particularly signalizing themselves by the liberality and magnificence they displayed in procuring relics of antiquities and valuable manuscripts and works of art. In Europe, in the 17th and 18th centuries, numerous museums, some exclusively appropriated to objects relating to one science only, and others of a more miscel laneous nature, were formed ; not by kings and princes only, but by numbers of private persons. In England, John Tradescant collected curiosities' of various kinds, and his museum constituted the nucleus or foundation of the Ashmolean Muaeum at Oxford. James Petiver, a London apothecary, formed a cabinet of natural history ; in Holland, Albert Seba distinguished himself as a collector of similar curiosities ; and John Swammerdan de voted much time and labour to the study of the natural history of the insect tribes, and to the formation of a valuable museum. The Ashmolean Museum was presented in 1836 to the University of Oxford by Elias Ashmole, an eminent herald and antiquary. It comprised originally specimens to illustrate natural history, and various artificial curiosities, especially Roman antiquities ; and since its establishment numerous additions have been made to it. Among the most celebrated collectors in England during the 18th century may be reckoned Richard Mead, an eminent physician, who accumulated a valuable cabinet of coins and medals, besides other interest ing objects ; Dr John Woodward, who applied himself especially, but not exclusively, to the collection and illustration of British minerals and fossil remains; and Sir Hans Sloane bequeathed to Government a magnificent musuem and library, in the formation of which he had expended up wards of fifty thousand pounds. This formed the
foundation of the British Museum, to which has since been added the donations of many eminent men, and has been aided by large annual grants from the Imperial Parliament. There are in Lon don, Edinburgh, and Dublin, indeed in nearly every large town in Britain, other museums which have attained a considerable size. On the conti nent of Europe, picture galleries, sculpture galleries, and collections of natural history are to be met with in all the principal towns ; and in the United States of America the collections that have been made rival those of the Old World.
The oldest museum in India was that of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, which included a Museum of Natural History and a Museum of Economic Geology, of which Mr. Blyth and Mr. Piddington for many years had been the respect ive curators.
The Asiatic Society of Bombay possessed a museum to which Dr. Carter, Dr. Bunt, and Dr. Impey contributed ; and the Madras Literary Society had a small collection of interest. In 1851, Surgeon (Surgeon-General) Edward Bal four formed the Government Central Museum at Madras, and in 1865 he founded the Mysore Museum at Bangalore ; and in 1855, to that at Madras he added a zoological collection, which was subsequently transferred to the People's Park.
The Madras Museum is free to the public, who formed it by their liberal donations ; the number of visitors amounted in the year 1855 to 201,987, and in the year 1856, 5-12,866 ; and the highest number since then was 709,009 in 1876. The visitors to the British Museum in 1878 were only 611,612. The Madras Museum embraces economic geology, all the branches of natural history, a public library, and collections of coins and anti quities. Calcutta got since an Imperial Museum.
The East Indian Company, from an early part of their career, had a museum in the India Office, at Leadenhall Street, and afterwards in West minster, which was transferred to the South Kensington Museum, of which it became a section. There is now a museum at Agra, one at Nagpur, another at Calcutta, one at Bombay, and one at Trevandrum.