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Egyptian Museum
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Egyptian Museum
The Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, commonly known as the Egyptian Museum (Arabic: المتحف المصري, romanized: al-Matḥaf al-Miṣrī, Egyptian Arabic: el-Matḥaf el-Maṣri [elˈmætħæf elˈmɑsˤɾi]) (also called the Cairo Museum), located in Cairo, Egypt, houses the largest collection of Egyptian antiquities in the world. It houses over 120,000 items, with a representative amount on display. Located in Tahrir Square in a building built in 1901, it is one of the largest art museums in Africa.
The Egyptian government established a museum in 1835 near the Ezbekieh Garden.
Youssef Diaa Effendi, the Director of the Antiquities Department, began inspecting the antiquities of Middle Egypt shortly after assuming his position, focusing on those discovered by farmers. In 1848, Muhammad Ali Pasha assigned Linan Bek, the Minister of Education, to compile a comprehensive report on archaeological sites and send artifacts to the Egyptian Museum. However, this effort was not successful due to the death of Muhammad Ali Pasha in 1849, followed by a period of instability. The trade in antiquities resurfaced, and the collection housed in the museum established in Azbakeya began to shrink until it was transferred to a single hall in the Cairo Citadel. The situation worsened when Khedive Abbas I donated the entire contents of this hall to Archduke Maximilian of Austria during his visit to the citadel in 1855; these are now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.
Following the foundation of the new Antiquities Department under the direction of Auguste Mariette, a new museum was established in 1858 at Boulaq in a former warehouse on the riverbank. Mariette considered the Boulaq Museum a temporary location, and after the significant damage the building suffered when the Nile flooded in 1878, he saw an opportunity to advocate for the establishment of a permanent museum with greater capacity to accommodate a larger collection of artifacts, while also being situated away from the flood path. After Mariette's death, he was succeeded by Gaston Maspero, who attempted to move the museum from Boulaq but was unsuccessful. By 1889, the building housing the collections reached its peak of overcrowding, with no available rooms for more artifacts, either in the exhibition halls or storage areas. Artifacts discovered during excavations were often left for long periods in boats in Upper Egypt. This dire situation led Khedive Ismail to offer one of his palaces in Giza, the location of the present-day zoo, to serve as the new museum. Between the summer and the end of 1889, all the artifacts were moved from the Boulaq Museum to Giza, and the artifacts were reorganized in the new museum by the scholar De Morgan, who served as the museum's director. From 1897 to 1899, Loret succeeded De Morgan, but Maspero returned to manage the museum from 1899 to 1914.
The artifacts remained there until 1902 when they were moved again to the current museum in Tahrir Square, built by the Italian company of Giuseppe Garozzo and Francesco Zaffrani to a design by the French architect Marcel Dourgnon.
The architectural design of the museum was created by the French architect Marcel Dournon in 1897, to be located in the northern area of Tahrir Square (formerly Ismailia Square), along the British Army barracks in Cairo near Qasr El-Nil. The foundation stone was laid on 1 April 1897, in the presence of Khedive Abbas Hilmi II, the Prime Minister, and all his cabinet members. The project was completed by the German architect Hermann Grabe. In November 1903, the Antiquities Department appointed the Italian architect Alessandro Parazenti, who had received the keys to the museum on 9 March 1902, and began the process of transferring the archaeological collections from Khedive Ismail's palace in Giza to the new museum. This operation involved the use of five thousand wooden carts, while large artifacts were transported by two trains, making about nineteen round trips between Giza and Qasr El-Nil. The first shipment carried approximately forty-eight stone coffins, weighing over a thousand tons in total. However, the transportation process was chaotic at times. The transfer was completed by 13 July 1902, and Mariette's tomb was moved to the museum garden in accordance with his wish to be buried among the artifacts he had spent much of his life collecting.
The Egyptian Museum was officially opened on 15 November 1902. The new museum adopted an exhibition style based on a gradual arrangement of halls, without allocating rooms for periods of turmoil, as they were considered historically insignificant. The artifacts in the museum were categorized by their themes, though for architectural reasons, large statues were placed on the ground floor, while funerary items were displayed on the first floor in chronological order. Each day, new artifacts were arranged and displayed according to their themes in various rooms. The museum became the only one in the world so filled with artifacts that it resembled a storage facility. When asked about this, Maspero replied that the Egyptian Museum was a reflection of a pharaonic tomb or temple, where every part of the space was used to display paintings or hieroglyphic inscriptions. Even the modern Egyptian home of that time used every part of the walls for paintings and images, making the museum a representation of both ancient and modern Egypt.
The museum's gardens used to reach the banks of the Nile; however, in 1954, the majority of the property was seized to build the Cairo Municipality Building.
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Egyptian Museum
The Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, commonly known as the Egyptian Museum (Arabic: المتحف المصري, romanized: al-Matḥaf al-Miṣrī, Egyptian Arabic: el-Matḥaf el-Maṣri [elˈmætħæf elˈmɑsˤɾi]) (also called the Cairo Museum), located in Cairo, Egypt, houses the largest collection of Egyptian antiquities in the world. It houses over 120,000 items, with a representative amount on display. Located in Tahrir Square in a building built in 1901, it is one of the largest art museums in Africa.
The Egyptian government established a museum in 1835 near the Ezbekieh Garden.
Youssef Diaa Effendi, the Director of the Antiquities Department, began inspecting the antiquities of Middle Egypt shortly after assuming his position, focusing on those discovered by farmers. In 1848, Muhammad Ali Pasha assigned Linan Bek, the Minister of Education, to compile a comprehensive report on archaeological sites and send artifacts to the Egyptian Museum. However, this effort was not successful due to the death of Muhammad Ali Pasha in 1849, followed by a period of instability. The trade in antiquities resurfaced, and the collection housed in the museum established in Azbakeya began to shrink until it was transferred to a single hall in the Cairo Citadel. The situation worsened when Khedive Abbas I donated the entire contents of this hall to Archduke Maximilian of Austria during his visit to the citadel in 1855; these are now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.
Following the foundation of the new Antiquities Department under the direction of Auguste Mariette, a new museum was established in 1858 at Boulaq in a former warehouse on the riverbank. Mariette considered the Boulaq Museum a temporary location, and after the significant damage the building suffered when the Nile flooded in 1878, he saw an opportunity to advocate for the establishment of a permanent museum with greater capacity to accommodate a larger collection of artifacts, while also being situated away from the flood path. After Mariette's death, he was succeeded by Gaston Maspero, who attempted to move the museum from Boulaq but was unsuccessful. By 1889, the building housing the collections reached its peak of overcrowding, with no available rooms for more artifacts, either in the exhibition halls or storage areas. Artifacts discovered during excavations were often left for long periods in boats in Upper Egypt. This dire situation led Khedive Ismail to offer one of his palaces in Giza, the location of the present-day zoo, to serve as the new museum. Between the summer and the end of 1889, all the artifacts were moved from the Boulaq Museum to Giza, and the artifacts were reorganized in the new museum by the scholar De Morgan, who served as the museum's director. From 1897 to 1899, Loret succeeded De Morgan, but Maspero returned to manage the museum from 1899 to 1914.
The artifacts remained there until 1902 when they were moved again to the current museum in Tahrir Square, built by the Italian company of Giuseppe Garozzo and Francesco Zaffrani to a design by the French architect Marcel Dourgnon.
The architectural design of the museum was created by the French architect Marcel Dournon in 1897, to be located in the northern area of Tahrir Square (formerly Ismailia Square), along the British Army barracks in Cairo near Qasr El-Nil. The foundation stone was laid on 1 April 1897, in the presence of Khedive Abbas Hilmi II, the Prime Minister, and all his cabinet members. The project was completed by the German architect Hermann Grabe. In November 1903, the Antiquities Department appointed the Italian architect Alessandro Parazenti, who had received the keys to the museum on 9 March 1902, and began the process of transferring the archaeological collections from Khedive Ismail's palace in Giza to the new museum. This operation involved the use of five thousand wooden carts, while large artifacts were transported by two trains, making about nineteen round trips between Giza and Qasr El-Nil. The first shipment carried approximately forty-eight stone coffins, weighing over a thousand tons in total. However, the transportation process was chaotic at times. The transfer was completed by 13 July 1902, and Mariette's tomb was moved to the museum garden in accordance with his wish to be buried among the artifacts he had spent much of his life collecting.
The Egyptian Museum was officially opened on 15 November 1902. The new museum adopted an exhibition style based on a gradual arrangement of halls, without allocating rooms for periods of turmoil, as they were considered historically insignificant. The artifacts in the museum were categorized by their themes, though for architectural reasons, large statues were placed on the ground floor, while funerary items were displayed on the first floor in chronological order. Each day, new artifacts were arranged and displayed according to their themes in various rooms. The museum became the only one in the world so filled with artifacts that it resembled a storage facility. When asked about this, Maspero replied that the Egyptian Museum was a reflection of a pharaonic tomb or temple, where every part of the space was used to display paintings or hieroglyphic inscriptions. Even the modern Egyptian home of that time used every part of the walls for paintings and images, making the museum a representation of both ancient and modern Egypt.
The museum's gardens used to reach the banks of the Nile; however, in 1954, the majority of the property was seized to build the Cairo Municipality Building.
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