Great miblie museums are of eomparatively recent date, for while Bacon in his Four .1 Han is outlines cneh an institution, the establishment of the British Museum in 1753 was the first realiza tion of this idea. In 1789 France transformed a royal into a national collection by opening, the Louvre to the public. Ind the United States did not formally establish a national museum until 1476. although it praetically came into existence in 1846. when the Smithsonian Institution was made the 01100111311 of the national collections. The influence of the many expositions held dur ing the latter half of the nineteenth century on museums has been very great; the construction of a building for the United States National Museum was a direct result of the Centennial Exposition of 1876, and the Field Columbian Museum, Chicago, owes its origin to the exhibi tion of 1893. The South Kensington Museum in London, the Ethnological Musemn of the Troca dero in Pai;is, and the Glasgow Art Gallery and Museum are largely due to similar causes.
The development of museums has not merely been in their size and number, hut in their scope and functions as well. Originally the specimens exhibited, especially in museums of natural his tory, comprised the greater or more important portion of the collections, and were mainly for the benefit of men of science. The modern plan is to restrict the number of pieces on exhibition and to select for this purpose those of the great est educational value; the bulk of material is placed in the reserve series, and is kept thus not merely for study, but for its better preservation, since light is one of the greatest enemies of museum specimens. The constantly increasing size of collections has had something to do in shaping this policy, but it is largely the result of a recognition of the fact that, so far as the general public was concerned, the educational in fluence of depended more on the quality of the things exhibited than on quantity. This has led to careful study of the hest methods of arranging, and labeling objects on exhibition and so displaying them that they may at tract and interest even the casual visitor. No man probably had more to do with bringing about this state of affairs than the late Sir William Flower, Director of the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and subsequently of the British Museum. while in the United States Dr. G. Brown Goode (q.v.) stands preinninent among those who have been most instrumental in making museums instructive to the pidle. There has been a corresponding evolution in the publications issued by museums. in making them of interest to the general public and not restrict ing them to papers of a technical nature. We have seen that private collections were formed not only for the preservation of material. but for its study, and this led to the publication of information thus acquired. The germ of museum publications. however, is to be found in the illus trated descriptive catalogue of small private 'cabinets.' The oldest of these works is that issued by Gesnor in 1565. describing one of the first systematic. collections, that of ,Johann Kent ma nn of Dresden. Public museums have followed the same path as private collectors; and while, like individuals, their publication was at first through the medium of scientific soeieties, the tendency is for museums to become their own publishers. As the transfer of great eollections
from private to public ownership made them aeeessible to a greater number of students than before, this in turn has led to the issuing of memoirs by other than regular members of their staff. Many museums also issue guide-books, hand-books, or.arti cies of a somewhat popular nature relating to their collections, and in line with this are of lectures 01) topics illus trated in the various departments of the institu tion. The steady trend of development has been in the line of extending their educational influence and making them of value to the many instead of to a favored few. Dr. Goode summed up the objects of museums as record, research, and publication: the preservation of material, its study, and the publication of information in the shape of books. and the spread of knowledge by the display of specimens. In a broad way museums may be divided into museums of nat m•al history and museums of anthropology, the former including all natural objects, the latter man and his works. Following Dr. Goode, they may be classified under the following heads: museums of art, natural history, history, anthro pology, technology, and commerce. Or, follow ing the same authority, mnseums may be classed according to their purposes as national, local, provincial, o• city; college, or school; pro fessional, or class museums, and museums of special research.
The collection of art museums in modern times began in Italy, where in the fourteenth century the rulers and the nobility began to make collec tions of coins and gems. Busts and statues were added later, and it was not until the seventeenth century that pictures and drawings were also introduced. The oldest important collections on record are those brought together by Cosmo de' Medici (13S9-1464), which form the basis of the present Florentine collections, of which the most important are the Uffizi and Pitti galleries, and the Museo Nazionale, The Vatican (q.v.) col lections trace their origin to Pope Julius II. (1503-13) besides these the principal museums of Rome are the Jalisco Nazionale and the Mu seum of the Lateran. Probably the equal of these in the wealth and diversity of its collec tion is the Louvre (q.v.), the National Museum of France, situated in Paris, which also contains the MusOe (le Cluny, and the Luxembourg (q.v.). The most important provincial cities of France also have museums, devoted chiefly to painting. In Germany the chief collections are the Royal Museums of Berlin, Dresden, and Munieh, and the Germanic 'Museum at Nuremberg. In Eng land the British :Museum (q.v.) is by far of the greatest importance. Austria has the Imperial museums of Vienna. The cities of Italy, notably Venice, Milan, and Naples, have nation al or municipal museums of importance. The Prado Inseutn in Madrid is the most im portant in Spain, which has sonic provincial museums, notably at Seville. The chief museum in Russia is the Hermitage at Saint Petersburg. In the United States the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Boston Museum of Fine Arts; and the Co•co•an Gallery. are among the more noteworthy. The United States is perhaps the only great nation without a na tional gallery.