Museums and Galleries Month – October 2024

History of Museums and Galleries Month

A museum is an institution that collects, stores, takes care of, and interprets objects, artifacts, and other evidence of history. Museums make these relics available for public viewing. The word is derived from the Ancient Greek ‘mouseion,’ which translates to “seat of muses.” The first known use of the word was in 15th century Florence. Initially, up until the 17th century even, the word was used for collections on display. In fact, a collection by John Tradescant was moved to the University of Oxford in 1677 and when it was opened to the public in 1683, it was named the Ashmolean Museum. The latter is considered to be the first museum open to the public that used the name ‘museum’.

The earliest museums though — before they were called museums — were private collections owned by private individuals. They were not accessible to the public in the slightest, only a small circle of society’s elite. They functioned as “wonder rooms” for social gatherings. The oldest-known museum was Princess Ennigaldi-Nanna’s personal museum that dates back to 530 B.C. Museum exhibits began opening to the public only during the Renaissance. The oldest-known public collection of art was the Capitoline museum, which was established in 1471.

Over time, other forms of museums began to spring up, accommodating different types of artifacts. Today, there exist open-air museums, museums that preserve old architecture, ecomuseums, virtual museums, archeology museums, art museums or galleries, history museums, maritime museums, war museums, and even temporary pop-up museums.