The Indian museum, 1814-1914.

  • Indian Museum.
Date:
1914
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Indian museum, 1814-1914. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)

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    activities. As early as 1889, the need for extended accommo- dation for work and study rooms in the zoological and archaeological sections made itself keenly felt. A proposal to construct rooms on the roof of the main building was pronounced impi'acticable. Consequently, in 1891 the Board of Trustees pressed upon the Government of Bengal to fulfill their pledge to build an additional wing to the Museum, as it had agreed to do six years earlier. Three years later, the local Government consented to provide for the accommodation of the offices, studies, laboratories, and store-rooms of the Museum and of the Geological Survey of India; this was accepted by the Trustees in satisfaction of all their outstanding claims. The building operations were commenced and carried on with a rapidity unknown in the annals of the Indian Museum, and in the following year the magnificent new east wing was completed and was available for use as soon as the internal fittings could be provided. The pressure upon the public galleries meanwhile con- tinued steadily to increase, and in 1904 a fresh scheme for the extension of the Museum building on the Chowringhee Road, which had been under prolonged consideration, took definite shape. The scheme was warmly welcomed by the govern- ment of Lord Curzon, and a handsome grant was generously provided to meet the cost of this extension. In 1911, this new wing of the Museum was practically completed, and its two lower floors were fitted up as public galleries ; the top floor of the recently erected range is utilized for the offices of the art and the archaeological sections, while that of the old building is arranged for use as laboratories, as offices of the zoological section, and, finally as a lecture hall for the whole institution. It is impossible within the time at my disposal to lay before the audience even a meagre account of the vast collections in the Indian Museum. But I must attempt a rapid survey of the various sources from which our collec- tions have been derived. The zoological collections have been derived mainly from five different sources. In the first place, we have the original specimens collected by the