promulgated regarding antiquities. In 1622 Christian IV of Denmark passed
one of theWrst edicts concerning the protection of antiquities. This was
followed by the statute published in Sweden by King Gustavus Adolphus
covering Swedish antiquities on 20 May 1630 (Schnapp 1993: 176) and later
by an antiquities law passed in 1666 (Jensen 2004: 64). The earliest date in
Scandinavia almost coincides with that of theWrst legislation by the pontiWcal
state, for in 1624 an edict prohibiting the export of marble or metal statues,
sculptures, antiquities and other artefacts was passed (Arata 1998: 48). Later,
in 1677, the Spanish town of Me ́rida dictated the preservation of its archaeo-
logical remains through a council bylaw (Mora 1998: 29). Neither Spain nor
Italy matched Sweden’s early institutionalization, with the creation of a chair
of archaeology in Uppsala in 1662, and the establishment of a College of
Antiquities in the university of the same town, an institution that would have
a great inXuence for many decades (Jensen 2004: 64; Klindt-Jensen 1975: 26).
It also seems that Daniel Georg Morhof (1639–91) taught lessons on antiquity
at the University of Kiel (Gran-Aymerich 1998: 115; Schiering 1969). In
addition to legislation, many countries in Europe also showed an interest in
antiquities by opening academies. Mirroring the creation of the Accademia
dei Lincei in Rome in 1603, in 1635 the Acade ́mie Franc ̧aise (French Acad-
emy) (Gassier 1906) was founded in Paris. From 1663 some of its members
specializing in history and antiquity created the Acade ́mie royale des inscrip-
tions et me ́dailles (later called Acade ́mie royale des inscriptions et belles-
lettres, shortened in English as the Academy of Inscriptions). In England the
Royal Society was created in 1662 (Lyons 1944).
However, the antiquities of individual nations were not the best looked
after. Objects coming from the Roman world had priority, as well as those
originating in the ancient Greek and Egyptian world. The latter two were
more diYcult to obtain, given the diYculties in trespassing on the frontiers
of the Ottoman Empire. Yet, some Greek and Egyptian material—mummies
and ushabtiWgures among other objects—started to reach private collections
such as that of the Danish physician Ole Worm, later bought for the Danish
royal collection (Gundestrup 1990: 48). This was one of many, and was
comparable to the older collections gathered in the courts of Munich, Vienna
(Kaufmann 1994), Dresden and Madrid (Mora ́n Turina & Rodrı ́guez Ruiz
2001).
From Europe to AmericaIn his search for a new route towards the Indies, Columbus’ arrival on the
island of Hispaniola in 1492 was most probably not theWrst landing of white
38 Early Archaeology of Great Civilizations