Editing Museum (section)

===Early ===
{{See also|List of museums from the 18th century}}
[[File:Campidoglio stampa antica.jpg|thumb|[[Palazzo dei Conservatori]], Musei Capitolini ca. 1747]]
The [[Capitoline Museums]] (Musei Capitolini), located on the [[Capitoline Hill]] in Rome, Italy, are widely considered to be the world's oldest public museum. Their origins can be traced back to 1471 when [[Pope Sixtus IV]] donated a collection of important ancient bronze sculptures to the people of Rome. This initial donation, which included iconic pieces such as the Capitoline Wolf, marked the beginning of what would become a vast repository of Roman art and artifacts. The museums were officially opened to the public in 1734 under [[Pope Clement XII]], establishing them as the first institution where art could be enjoyed by ordinary people rather than just the owners.<ref name=":5">{{Cite book |last=Paul |first=Carole |title=The first modern museums of art : the birth of an institution in 18th- and early-19th-century Europe |publisher=Getty Publications |year=2012 |isbn=978-1606061206 |location=Los Angeles |publication-date=2012 |pages=21–25}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=The Oldest Museums Around the World |url=https://artsandculture.google.com/story/the-oldest-museums-around-the-world/RgURWUHwa_fKSA?hl=en |access-date=2025-03-14 |website=Google Arts & Culture |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Museo Capitolino e Pinacoteca |url=https://www.museicapitolini.org/it/il_museo/storia_del_museo/museo_capitolino_e_pinacoteca |access-date=2025-03-14 |website=www.museicapitolini.org}}</ref>

The Capitoline Museums' significance represent a crucial moment in the development of cultural institutions. Their creation symbolized a shift in the ownership and accessibility of art, transitioning from private collections to public patrimony. The museums' collections have grown over the centuries to include ancient Roman statues, medieval and Renaissance art, jewelry, coins, and other historic artifacts.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Estrada |first=Andrea |date=2014-07-24 |title=Origins of the public art museum |url=https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/origins-public-art-museum |access-date=2025-03-14 |website=University of California |language=en}}</ref><ref name=":5" />

[[Vatican Museums]] (Musei Vaticani), located in [[Vatican City]], Rome, houses an extensive collection of art and historical artifacts amassed by the Catholic Church over centuries traces its origins with the purchase of a single marble sculpture, [[Laocoön and His Sons]], which was put on public display in 1506 by [[Pope Julius II]].<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Oxford handbook of Greek and Roman art and architecture |publisher=The Oxford handbook of Greek and Roman art and architecture |year=2014 |isbn=9780199983711 |editor-last=Marconi |editor-first=Clemente |location=Oxford |publication-date=2014}}</ref>

Other early museums began as the private collections of wealthy individuals, families or institutions of art and rare or curious natural objects and [[artifact (archaeology)|artifacts]]. These were often displayed in so-called "wonder rooms" or [[cabinet of curiosities|cabinets of curiosities]]. These collections first emerged in western Europe, then spread into other parts of the world.<ref>Chang Wan-Chen, ''A cross-cultural perspective on musealization: the museum's reception by China and Japan in the second half of the nineteenth century'' in ''Museum and Society'', vol 10, 2012.</ref>

[[File:Ashmolean Museum (BM 1954,1103.1).jpg|thumb|left|upright|The old [[Ashmolean Museum]] building in [[Oxford]], England]]Public access to these collections was often possible only at the whim of the owner and his staff. One way that elite men during this time period gained a higher social status in the world of elites was by becoming a collector of these curious objects and displaying them. Many of the items in these collections were new discoveries and these collectors or naturalists, since many of these people held interest in natural sciences, were eager to obtain them. By putting their collections in a museum and on display, they not only got to show their fantastic finds but also used the museum as a way to sort and "manage the empirical explosion of materials that wider dissemination of ancient texts, increased travel, voyages of discovery, and more systematic forms of communication and exchange had produced".<ref>Findlen, p. 3.</ref>

One of these naturalists and collectors was [[Ulisse Aldrovandi]], whose collection policy of gathering as many objects and facts about them was "encyclopedic" in nature, reminiscent of that of Pliny, the Roman philosopher and naturalist.<ref>Findlen, p. 62.</ref> The idea was to consume and collect as much knowledge as possible, to put everything they collected and everything they knew in these displays. In time, however, museum philosophy would change and the encyclopedic nature of information that was so enjoyed by Aldrovandi and his cohorts would be dismissed as well as "the museums that contained this knowledge". The 18th-century scholars of the [[Age of Enlightenment]] saw their ideas of the museum as superior and based their natural history museums on "organization and taxonomy" rather than displaying everything in any order after the style of Aldrovandi.<ref>Findlen, pp. 393–397.</ref>

When the [[British Museum]] opened to the public in 1759, it was a concern that large crowds could damage the artifacts. Prospective visitors to the British Museum had to apply in writing for admission, and small groups were allowed into the galleries each day.<ref>{{cite web | publisher=[[The British Museum]] | title=Admission Ticket to the British Museum | url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/archives/a/admission_ticket_to_the_britis.aspx | access-date=12 April 2014 | archive-date=13 April 2014 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140413155944/https://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/archives/a/admission_ticket_to_the_britis.aspx | url-status=dead }}</ref> The British Museum became increasingly popular during the 19th century, amongst all age groups and social classes who visited the British Museum, especially on public holidays.<ref name="BM">{{cite web |url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/the_museum/history/general_history.aspx |title=History of the British Museum |publisher=British Museum |access-date=15 June 2017 |archive-date=12 April 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120412162528/http://www.britishmuseum.org/the_museum/history/general_history.aspx |url-status=live }}</ref>

The [[Ashmolean Museum]], founded in 1677 from the personal collection of [[Elias Ashmole]], was set up in the [[University of Oxford]] to be open to the public.<ref>Swann, Marjorie (2001), Curiosities and Texts: The Culture of Collecting in Early Modern England, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press</ref> The collection included that of [[Elias Ashmole]] which he had collected himself, including objects he had acquired from the gardeners, travellers and collectors [[John Tradescant the elder]] and [[John Tradescant the Younger|his son of the same name]]. The collection included antique coins, books, engravings, geological specimens, and zoological specimens—one of which was the stuffed body of the last [[dodo]] ever seen in Europe; but by 1755 the stuffed dodo was so moth-eaten that it was destroyed, except for its head and one claw. The museum opened on 24 May 1683, with [[natural history|naturalist]] [[Robert Plot]] as the first keeper. The first building, which became known as the [[Museum of the History of Science, Oxford|Old Ashmolean]], is sometimes attributed to [[Christopher Wren|Sir Christopher Wren]] or Thomas Wood.<ref>H. E. Salter and Mary D. Lobel (editors) [[Victoria County History]] [http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=63866 ''A History of the County of Oxford: Volume 3'' 1954 Pages 47–49] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130208052143/http://british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=63866 |date=8 February 2013 }}</ref>

[[File:Réunion des Tuileries au Louvre 1852–1857 Getty Museum vol1 05 View of the Cour Napoléon toward the Tuileries.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|left|The Louvre in 1853]]
In France, the first public museum was the [[Louvre]] in [[Paris]],<ref>{{cite web|title=History of Louvre |url=http://www.louvre.fr/en/history-louvre |publisher=History of Louvre |access-date=14 November 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131024093225/http://www.louvre.fr/en/history-louvre |archive-date=24 October 2013}}</ref> opened in 1793 during the [[French Revolution]], which enabled for the first time free access to the former French royal collections for people of all stations and status. The fabulous art treasures collected by the French [[monarchy]] over centuries were accessible to the public three days each "''décade''" (the 10-day unit which had replaced the week in the [[French Republican Calendar]]). The ''Conservatoire du muséum national des Arts'' (National Museum of Arts's Conservatory) was charged with organizing the Louvre as a national public museum and the centerpiece of a planned national museum system. As [[Napoleon|Napoléon I]] conquered the great cities of Europe, confiscating art objects as he went, the collections grew and the organizational task became more and more complicated. After Napoleon was defeated in 1815, many of the treasures he had amassed were gradually [[Repatriation (cultural heritage)|returned to their owners]] (and many were not). His plan was never fully realized, but his concept of a museum as an agent of nationalistic fervor had a profound influence throughout Europe.

[[File:The South Building of Nantong Museum 01 2013-01.JPG|thumbnail|The [[Nantong Museum]], the first Chinese-sponsored museum]]
[[Chinese people|Chinese]] and [[Japanese people|Japanese]] visitors to Europe were fascinated by the museums they saw there, but had cultural difficulties in grasping their purpose and finding an equivalent Chinese or Japanese term for them. Chinese visitors in the early 19th century named these museums based on what they contained, so defined them as "bone amassing buildings" or "courtyards of treasures" or "painting pavilions" or "curio stores" or "halls of military feats" or "gardens of everything". Japan first encountered Western museum institutions when it participated in Europe's World's Fairs in the 1860s. The British Museum was described by one of their delegates as a 'hakubutsukan', a 'house of extensive things' – this would eventually become accepted as the equivalent word for 'museum' in Japan and China.<ref>Chang Wan-Chen, ''A cross-cultural perspective on musealization: the museum's reception by China and Japan in the second half of the nineteenth century'' in ''Museum and Society'', vol. 10, 2012.</ref>