In 1843 the Austrian Geschichtsverein fu ̈rKa ̈rnten (Ka ̈rnten Historical Soci-
ety) was established and the publication of a scholarly journal,Carinthia,
started soon after (Urban in Murray 2001: 127). In the Austrian part of
Poland a society of the Friends of the Sciences was created in Poznan in
1857 (Sklena ́r 1983: 78, 80). The Moscow Archaeological Society seems to
have appeared around these years (Klejn & Tikhonov 2006: 198). Some
authors have stressed the importance of the new means of transport in the
proliferation of newWnds that bolstered interest in membership of regional
societies and facilitated communication between them (Hudson 1981; Van
Riper 1993; Vernon 1998). The importance of this would, however, increase
later in the nineteenth century (Chapter 13).
The interests in the region were complementary to those of the nation.
Consequently the aim of the promoters of the regional institutions was to
highlight the speciWc contributions of their own region to the nation. Among
the national associations one has to speak about those created in the eight-
eenth century—including, for example, the Czech Society in Prague (Sklena ́r
1983: 77), and others established in these years such as the Austrian Imperial
Academy of Sciences of 1847 (ibid.77). Interestingly, some of the associations
mentioned in this paragraph were created in countries which only later would
become independent such as Ireland, Czechia, and Norway. Thus, in 1840 the
Irish Archaeological Society was created. It would join the Celtic Society
founded a few years later and formed the Irish Archaeological and Celtic
Society in 1854 (Waddell 2005: 114). The Czech Archaeological Committee
started to function in 1843, funding excavations and, from 1852, publishing
its own journal (Sklena ́r 1983: 81). Almost every archaeologist in the country
was a member. AWnal example of a national association is the Society for the
Preservation of Norwegian Antiquities founded in 1844 (Mytum in Murray
2001: 865).
Another national association was that founded in Britain in 1843 as a
reaction to the apathy of the Society of Antiquaries. Its name was the British
Archaeological Association for the Encouragement and Prosecution of Re-
searches into the Arts and Monuments of the Early and Middle Ages. The new
association decided to hold a congress in Canterbury in 1844. This would be
one of theWrst archaeological congresses ever organized in the world. 5
Discussions were arranged into four sections: Primeval, Medieval, Architec-
tural, and Historical and a barrow-digging expedition and excursions were
also planned. The meetingWnished with the spectacle of an Egyptian mummy
5 I have not been able toWnd the starting date for the annual conferences organized by the
Socie ́te ́Franc ̧aise d’Arche ́ologie created with the name of Socie ́te ́pour la conservation et la
description des monuments historiques in 1833–4 (Gran-Aymerich 1998: 114, 135).
Liberal Revolutions (c. 1820–1860) 363