Museum of Archeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge

The Museum of Archeology and Anthropology (German Museum of Archeology and Anthropology at the University of Cambridge ), MAA for short, houses collections of local antiquities together with archaeological and ethnographic finds from around the world.

Location

The museum is situated in the city of Cambridge and is located on the Downing Site of the University, at the corner of Downing Street and Tennis Court Road . The Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences and the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology , as well as other museums of the University of Cambridge, are in close proximity . Three of the university's colleges can be found in the vicinity of the museum: Emmanuel College in the east, Downing College in the south, and Pembroke College in the west.

history

The university established the Museum of General and Local Archeology in 1884. The museum originally exhibited collections of local antiques from the Cambridge Antiquarian Society . Artifacts from Polynesia were later donated to the museum by Alfred Maudslay and Sir Arthur Gordon . The Austrian Anatole von Hügel (1854–1928), the museum's first curator , donated his own collection of artefacts from the South Seas to the MAA . A collection of West Australian Aboriginal material has been acquired from Emile Clement. Further materials come from the Torres Straits expedition that took place in 1898 under Alfred Haddon and William Halse Rivers Rivers , both influential anthropologists and ethnologists who encouraged their students - including Alfred Radcliffe-Brown and Gregory Bateson - to commit to the museum.

In 1913, Von Hügel initiated the MAA's move to its larger, purpose-built building on Downing Street. The new galleries were not fully installed until after the end of the First World War . Various relocations and donations in the 1910s and 1920s - including finds from James Cook's expeditions - enabled an extensive expansion of the museum's holdings.

Von Huegel's successors as curator were Louis Colville Gray Clarke (1922-1937), Thomas Paterson (1937-1948), Geoffrey Bushnell (1948-1970), Peter Gathercole and David Phillipson. The current position of director of the MAA is Nicholas Thomas.

In the museum

The MAA has three floors. On the ground floor, called The Clarke Gallery , visitors will find collections from the field of archeology. On the second floor, which is called The Maudslay Gallery , anthropological exhibits can be admired. On the third floor, The Andrews Gallery , there are changing exhibitions.

In November 2010, extensive renovation work began in the entrance area of the MAA. The reopening took place after 18 months on May 25, 2012.