By the 1850s the collectors had stripped many sites. The change began with a young Frenchman sent to Egypt by the Louvre in 1850 to buy Coptic manuscripts. Auguste Mariette (1821–1881) spent the money digging instead.
Key idea
Mariette found the Serapeum at Saqqara, the underground burial galleries of the Apis bulls, in 1850–1851. In 1858 the ruler Said Pasha made him head of a new Antiquities Service, with control over excavation in Egypt, and in 1863 he opened a national museum at Bulaq in Cairo, so that finds could stay in Egypt.
Why it works
Protection needs an institution. A law means little without people to enforce it, a register of what exists, and a place to keep finds. Mariette's Service licensed excavators, took charge of sites and sent important finds to the museum, where they were catalogued. It was far from perfect, but it put control of Egypt's antiquities inside Egypt.
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1850–1851 | Mariette uncovers the avenue of sphinxes and the Serapeum at Saqqara |
| 1858 | Said Pasha creates the post of conservator of monuments for him: the Antiquities Service begins |
| 1863 | The museum at Bulaq, on the Nile in Cairo, opens |
| 1871 | Verdi's opera Aida, from a story sketched by Mariette, opens in Cairo |
| 1881 | Mariette dies in Cairo; Gaston Maspero succeeds him |
| 1902 | The collection moves to the new Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square, Cairo |
Worked example: Why a museum in Egypt mattered
Before 1863, a statue dug up in Egypt usually ended up in Europe. How did the Bulaq museum change that?
- Licensed excavators now had to report finds to the Service.
- Important finds went to the museum in Cairo, where they were registered and displayed.
- Egypt now had a place to keep its own past, and a reason for visitors to come to Cairo to see it.
Answer: It gave finds a home in Egypt and a register.
Worked example: A mixed record
Mariette is called a founder of Egyptian archaeology. Name one strength and one weakness of his work.
- Strength: he built the Service and the museum, cleared great sites such as the Serapeum, and was among the first in Egypt to photograph finds.
- Weakness: he dug quickly with large workforces, recorded little by later standards, lost many notes in an 1878 flood, and kept Egyptians, such as the young Ahmed Kamal, out of senior posts.
- A fair verdict holds both.
Answer: He built institutions; his digging and his treatment of Egyptian colleagues fell short.
Common mistake
Thinking all early finds left Egypt. From 1858 Mariette's Service began the effort to keep them, and from 1863 the museum gave them a home. Many objects still left, under a system that divided finds with foreign excavators, but the direction had changed.
The Antiquities Service was run by French directors until 1952. Its successor today is the Supreme Council of Antiquities. Egyptian scholars' place in it is told in Egyptian Egyptologists.