impartiality as well as loyalty to the nation-state were sought (Fischer & Peter
1975: 457). Academic study was one of the activities for which institutional-
ization increased in this period. Archaeology, however, was only partially
aVected at this time. This is because, despite the growing perception of its
importance, archaeology was still considered to be an inferior means of
acquiring knowledge of ancient times. For most antiquarian-archaeologists
the study of the object was only a minor pursuit. They predominantly
followed the philological model, in which archaeology was mainly centred
upon the study of ancient works of art and was kept as a secondary tool for
history and philology which helped to conWrm the information provided in
texts (Schnapp 1991). Because of this, history and philology took precedence
in their institutionalization and archaeology was aVected only to a limited
extent.
Despite the inadequacy of institutionalization of archaeology in the era of
the revolutions there were a few institutions in which archaeology was valued.
They were new creations such as the Museum of French Monuments, the
Louvre, the French Institute of Egypt in Cairo, teaching of Egyptian archae-
ology in the Colle`ge de France, and new legislation on antiquities in Rome.
TheWrst one of these was not successful in the short term, at least in relation
to French archaeology. It could also be argued that the Louvre was not an
original idea of the revolution. The initial core of the collection had come
from the royal Luxembourg Gallery, where paintings had been shown to the
public between 1750 and 1779. Well before the closure of the Luxembourg
museum, due to its conversion into a household for a brother of Louis XVI,
there had been plans to open a larger, more magniWcent museum of art. Thus,
the revolutionists appropriated the project by putting it to the service of their
new ideas and this makes it understandable that, immediately after the fall of
the monarchy, the royal collection was declared national property. Indeed, the
Louvre was not even theWrst museum to be open to the public. These types of
institutions were framed during the Enlightenment as described in Chapter 2.
Some authors have described the UYzi Gallery in Florence of 1769 as theWrst
‘national’ gallery, given that it belonged to the state (the Granducato of
Tuscany) and aimed to present a comprehensive collection of works of art
throughout the history of Tuscany starting with Etruscan art (Bjurstro ̈m
1996: 41). One could also consider the British Museum as one of the earliest
National Museums as it was founded in 1753. 1 What the era of revolutions did
as against the previous period was to bring success to the Enlightened project
and put it into the service of the political nation. It is only in this context that
1 Although, as explained earlier in the text, the British Museum was originally a library
decorated with antiquities and other specimens (Opper 2004).
62 Early Archaeology of Great Civilizations