Muséums et collections d’histoire naturelle : quelle place dans l’histoire des musées ?

Abstract

Muséums and Natural History Collections : ivhat Place in the History of Museums ? The evolution of scientific knowledge informed the creation of scientific museums and collections and, in turn, was also partially shaped by them. After recalling the essential role played by the «muséums » in the history of museums, this essay focuses on the key role played by medical doctors in the creation of curiosity cabinets and museums, and on the effect, which these institutions in turn had on the increasing professionalization of scientific research in Europe up until the nineteenth century, a time when collecting and research began to be seen as conflicting activities. This opposition still rules today and continues to structure the relations between natural history museums and universities. Using French museums as a case study, the author elucidates these differences in three pivotal moments : -The early seventeenth century is the time when, for the first time in France, a rupture occurred between the university and the museum as rival exhibition spaces. This break, which was specific to France, was directly related to the model of the recently created Jardin Royal des Plantes Médicinales. -In the early eighteenth century, the professionalization of the scientific community within the natural history museums was founded on a break with the medical milieu. -During the second half of the nineteenth century, the role of the « muséums » in promoting the study of natural sciences declined. This was exactly the time when the natural sciences became more diversified. Parallel to this evolution, the natural history museums also underwenst a profound change with the introduction of the modern concept of exhibition, and they developed their activity as sites for the diffusion of sciences. With the current revival of naturalist collections as both a means to foster awareness of environmental concerns and as a trove of references of earlier stages of evolution used for scientific studies and modelizing, it may be ask whether naturalist collections should not be preserved as examples and artifacts of intangible heritage.