National Museum of Natural History, France: Difference between revisions

| image = File:Paris 75005 Grande Galerie de l'Evolution 20070804.jpg

| established = {{Start date and age|1793|06|10}}

DECENNAL DES MUSEES DE FRANCE">{{Cite web |url=http://www2.culture.gouv.fr/documentation/joconde/fr/partenaires/AIDEMUSEES/journee_RDterr_2014/diaporama-MCL.pdf |title=BILAN DU PREMIER RECOLEMENT DECENNAL DES MUSEES DE FRANCE |work=www.mnhn.fr |date=10 October 2014}}</ref>

| visitors = 13.98 million perin year{{cn|date=July2023<ref>Le 2022}}Figaro, January 14, 2024</ref>

| director = Gilles BœufBloch

The French '''National Museum of Natural History''', known in [[French language|French]] as the '''''{{Lang|fr|Muséum national d'histoire naturelle}}''''' (abbreviation '''MNHN'''), is the national [[natural history museum]] of [[France]] and a ''{{lang|fr|[[grand établissement]]}}'' of higher education part of [[Sorbonne University (alliance)|Sorbonne Universities]]. The main museum, with four galleries, is located in [[Paris]], France, within the [[Jardin des Plantes]] on the left bank of the River [[Seine]]. It was formally founded in 1793, during the [[French Revolution]], but was begun even earlier in 1635 as the royal garden of medicinal plants. The museum now has 14 sites throughout France.

=== 17th–18th century ===

The museum was formally established on June 10, 1793, by the [[French Convention]], the government during the [[French Revolution]], at the same time that it established the [[Louvre Museum]].<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Muséum national de'histoire naturalle" (2004, p.14</ref> But its origins went back much further, to the Royal Garden of Medicinal Plants, which was created by [[Louis XIII of France|King Louis XIII]] in 1635, and was directed and run by the royal [[physician]]s. A royal proclamation of the boy-king [[Louis XV of France|Louis XV]] on 31 March 1718, removed the purely medical function. Besides growing and studying plants useful for health, the royal garden offered public lectures on botany, chemistry, and comparative anatomy. In 1729, the chateau in the garden was enlarged with an upper floor, and transformed into the cabinet of natural history, designed for the royal collections of zoology and mineralogy. A series of greenhouses were constructed on the west side of the garden, to study the plants and animals collected by French explorers for their for medical and commercial uses.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Muséum national de'histoire naturelle" (2004), ppp. 4-54–5</ref>

Following the [[French Revolution]] the museum was reorganized, with twelve professorships of equal rank. Some of its early professors included eminent comparative anatomist [[Georges Cuvier]] and the pioneers of the theory of evolution. , [[Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck]] and [[Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire]]. The museum's aims were to instruct the public, put together collections and conduct scientific research. The naturalist [[Louis Jean Marie Daubenton]] wrote extensively about biology for the pioneer French [[Encyclopédie]], and gave his name to several newly discovered species. The museum sent its trained botanists on scientific expeditions around the world. Major figures in the museum included [[Déodat de Dolomieu]], who gave his name to the mineral [[dolomite (mineral)|dolomite]] and to a volcano on [[Réunion|Reunion]] island, and the botanist [[Rene Desfontaines]], who spent two years collecting plants for study Tunisia and Algeria, and whose book "Flora Atlantica" (1798–1799, 2 vols), added three hundred genera new to science.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Muséum national de'histoire naturelle" (2004), p. 9</ref>

File:Maison Singes MJP.jpg|Crowd outside the Palace of the Apes (c. {{circa|1900}}) in the [[Jardin des Plantes]]

The museum continued to flourish during the 19th century, particularly under the direction of [[chemist]] [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]], His research with animal fats <ref>Chevreul, M.E., ''Recherches sur les corps gras d'origine animale,'' F.G. Levrault, Paris, 1823</ref> revolutionized the manufacture of soap and of candles and led to his isolation of the [[Heptadecanoic acid|heptadecanoic (margaric)]], stearic, and [[oleic acid|oleic]] [[fatty acid]]s. In the medical field, he was first to demonstrate that [[diabetes|diabetics]] excrete [[glucose]].<ref>Chevreul, M.E. ''Note sur le Sucre de Diabetes,'' Annales de Chemie, Paris 1815</ref> and to isolate [[creatine]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.scq.ubc.ca/an-introduction-to-creatine |title=An Introduction to Creatine |date=2016-11-23 |access-date=2021-08-15 |archive-date=2021-08-15 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210815093235/https://www.scq.ubc.ca/an-introduction-to-creatine |url-status=live }}</ref> His theories of color "provided the scientific basis for Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painting."<ref>Itten, Johannes, ''The Art of Color,'' New York, 1961</ref>

[[Henri Becquerel]] held the chair for Applied Physics at the ''{{lang|fr|Muséum}}'' (1892–1908). By wrapping uranium salts in photographic paper, he first demonstrated the radioactive properties of [[uranium]]. In 1903, he shared the [[Nobel Prize in Physics]] with [[Pierre Curie]] and [[Marie Curie]] for the discovery of spontaneous radioactivity.<ref>[https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1903/becquerel/biographical/ Henri Becquerel – Biographical] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171219232947/https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1903/becquerel-bio.html |date=2017-12-19 }} Nobelprize.org.</ref> Four generations of Becquerels held this chairmanship, from 1838 to 1948.<ref>{{cite journal |author=A. Allisy |title=Henri Becquerel: The Discovery of Radioactivity |journal=Radiation Protection Dosimetry |volume=68 |issue=1 |pages=3–10 |date=November 1, 1996 |url=http://rpd.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/68/1-2/3 |doi=10.1093/oxfordjournals.rpd.a031848 |access-date=March 20, 2007 |archive-date=August 28, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070828142117/http://rpd.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/68/1-2/3 |url-status=live }}</ref>

As its collections grew, the museum was enlarged, with the construction of a new gallery of zoology. it was begun in 1877 and completed in 1889, for the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. A new [[Gallery of Paleontology and Comparative Anatomy|gallery of paleontology and comparative anatomy]] was opened in 1898. The cost of construction Drained the museum budget and it began to run short of funds. Its emphasis on teaching brought it into conflict with the [[University of Paris]], which had better political connections. It gradually scaled back its program of teaching and focused primarily on research and the museum collections.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Muséum national de'histoire naturelle" (2004), ppp. 20-2220–22</ref>

Some of the buildings, particularly the Grand Gallery of Evolution, completed in 1889, were in poor condition by the mid-20th century. It was closed entirely in 1965, then underwent major restoration between 1991 and 1994 to its present state.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Muséum national de'histoire naturelle" (2004), ppp. 20-2220–22</ref>

The birthplace of the museum and a large part of its modern collections are found in five galleries in the [[Jardin des Plantes]]. These are the Gallery of Evolution; the Gallery of Mineralogy and Geology; the Gallery of Botany; the [[Gallery of Paleontology and Comparative Anatomy]] and the Laboratory of Entomology.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), p. 38</ref>

File:Giant squid (Architeuthis sanctipauli) replica in Muséum national d'histoire naturelle (France).jpg|A plastified [[giant squid]], nine meters long, in the Gallery of Evolution

The National Museum of Natural History has been called "the Louvre of the Natural Sciences.".<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), p. 38</ref> Its largest and best-known gallery is the Grand Gallery of Evolution, located at the end of the central alley facing the formal garden. It replaced an earlier Neoclassical gallery built next to the same by Buffon, opened in 1785, and demolished in 1935. It was proposed in 1872 and begun in 1877 by the architect [[Louis-Jules André]], a teacher at the influential [[École des Beaux-Arts]] in Paris. It is a prominent example of [[Beaux Arts Architecture]]. It was opened in 1889 for the [[Exposition Universelle (1889)|Paris Universal Exposition of 1889]], which also presented the [[Eiffel Tower]]. It was never fully completed in its original design; it never received the neoclassical entrance planned for the side of the building away from the garden, facing Rue Geoffroy-Saint-Hilaire.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), p. 38</ref>

The facade of the building was designed specifically as a backdrop for the garden. The facade facing the garden is divided into eleven traverses. Ten are decorated with sculpted medallions honouring prominent French scientists associated with the museum. The central traverse has a larger marble statue of a woman seated holding a book, in a pose similar to that of statue of Buffon facing the building. The statues are the work of [[Eugene Guillaume]], a pupil of the sculptor Pradier.

While the building exterior was neo-classical, the iron framework of the interior was extremely modern for the 19th century, like that of the [[Gare d'Orsay]] railroad station of the same period. It contained an immense rectangular hall, 55 meters long, 25 wide and 15 meters high, supported by forty slender cast-iron columns, and was originally covered with a glass roof one thousand square meters in size.The building suffered from technical problems, and was closed entirely in 1965. It was extensively remodelled between 1991–941991 and 1994 and reopened in its present form.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), p. 39</ref>

The great central hall, kept in its same form but enlarged during the modernisation, is devoted to the presentation of marine animals on the lower sides, and, on a platform in the center, a parade of full-size African mammals, including a [[rhinoceros]] originally presented to King Louis XV in the 18th century. On the garden side is another hall, in its original size, devoted to animals which have disappeared or are in danger of extinction.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), ppp. 40-4140–41</ref>

File:Météorite Canyon Diablo.JPG|Fragment of the [[Canyon Diablo (meteorite)|Canyon Diablo Meteorite]] which created [[Meteor Crater]] in Arizona

The gallery contains over 600,000 stones and fossils. It is particularly known for its collection of giant crystals, including colourful examples of [[azurite]], [[Tourmaline]] (Rubelite), [[Malachite]] and [[Ammonite]]. Other displays include the jars and vestiges of the original royal apothecary of Louis XIV, and three Florentine marble marquetry tables from the palace of [[Cardinal Mazarin]].<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), ppp. 42-4342–43</ref>

The gallery also contains a large collection of [[meteorites]], gathered from around the world. These include a large fragment of [[Canyon Diablo (meteorite)|Canyon Diablo meteorite]], a piece of an [[asteroid]] which fell in Arizona about 550,000 years ago, and created the [[Meteor crater]]. It weighs 360 kilograms (970 pounds).<ref>[https://www.jardindesplantesdeparis.fr/fr/programme/galeries-jardins-zoo-bibliotheques/galerie-geologie-mineralogie-2769] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210823174529/https://www.jardindesplantesdeparis.fr/fr/programme/galeries-jardins-zoo-bibliotheques/galerie-geologie-mineralogie-2769 |date=2021-08-23 }} site of the Jardin des Plantes- Gallery of Geology and Mineralogy</ref>

The primary content of the gallery is the Herbier National, a collection representing 7.5 million plants collected since the founding of the muuseummuseum. They are divided for study into [[Spermatophytes]], plants which reproduce with seeds, and [[cryptogams]], plants which reproduce with [[spores]], such as [[algae]], [[lichens]] and [[mushrooms]]. Many of the plants were collected by [[Jean Baptiste Christophore Fusée Aublet]], the royal pharmacist and botanist in [[French Guiana]]. In 1775 he published his "Histoire des plantes de la Guiane Française" describing 576 genera and 1,241 species of neotropical plants, including more than 400 species that were new to science, at a time when only 20,000 plants had been described,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Mori |first1=Scott A. |title=Jean Baptiste Christophe Fusée Aublet (1720-17781720–1778) |url=https://www.nybg.org/botany/mori/lecythidaceae/publications/AUBLET/Aublet_main.htm |website=NYBG |publisher=New York Botanic Garden |access-date=2021-08-25 |archive-date=2021-10-10 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211010111816/https://www.nybg.org/botany/mori/lecythidaceae/publications/AUBLET/Aublet_main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

The Gallery of Paleontology and Comparative Anatomy was built between 1894 and 1897 by architect [[Ferdinand Dutert]], who had built the innovative iron-framed [[Galerie des machines]] at the [[Exposition Universelle (1889)|1889 Paris Exposition]]. A new pavilion in the same style was added to the west side of the gallery; it was completed in 1961. In front of the Gallery is the Iris Garden, created in 1964, which displays 260 varieties of iris flowers, and a sculpture, "Nymph with a pitcher" (1837) by Isidore Hippolyte Brion. The sides of gallery are also decorated with sculpture; twelve relief sculptures of animals in bronze and fourteen medallions of famous biologists. The ironwork grill and stone arches over the entrance are filled with elaborate designs and sculpture of seashells. Inside the entrance is a large marble statue of an [[Orangutan]] strangling a hunter, created in 1885 by the noted animal sculptor [[Emmanuel Fremiet]], best known for his statue of [[Joan of Arc]] on horseback on the [[Place des Pyramides]] in Paris.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette (2004), p. 45</ref>

The [[Jardin des plantes]] is the home of the main galleries of the National Museum of Natural History, and a division of the museum, which was born there. The garden was founded by Louis XIII 1635 as the Royal Garden of medicinal plants, under the direction of the royal physician. In the early 18th century, the chateau of the gardens was enlarged to house the collections of the royal pharmacist. In 1729, this collection was broadened into the Cabinet of Natural History, destined to receive the Royal collections dedicated to zoology and mineralogy. New plants and animal species were collected from around the world, examined, illustrated, classified, named and described in publications which were circulated across Europe and to America.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette (2004), ppp. 4-54–5</ref> An amphitheater was constructed in the garden in 1787 to provide a venue for lectures and classes on the new discoveries. New greenhouses were built beginning in 1788, and the size of the gardens was doubled. The gardens served as the laboratory of scientists including [[Jean Baptiste Lamarck]], author of the earliest theory of evolution, and were a base for major scientific expeditions by [[Nicolas Baudin]], [[Alexander von Humboldt]], [[Jules Dumont d'Urville]] and others throughout the 18th and 19th century.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette (2004), ppp. 28-2928–29</ref>

The gardens today include a large formal garden planted in geometric designs; and two enormous greenhouses, keeping tropical plants at a steady temperature of 22 degrees Celsius. The Alpine gardens present plants coming from Corsica, the Caucasus, North American and the Himalaya. The gardens of the School of Botany contain 3,800 species of plants, displayed by genre and family.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady and Labalette (2004), ppp. 28-2928–29</ref>

File:Panthères de Chine.JPG|[[Amur leopard]]s

The Menagerie is the second-oldest public zoo in the world still in operation, following the [[Tiergarten Schönbrunn]] in Vienna, Austria, founded in 1752.<ref>[https://www.jardindesplantesdeparis.fr/en/going-further/history-menagerie-zoo-jardin-plantes-2992] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210807152235/https://www.jardindesplantesdeparis.fr/en/going-further/history-menagerie-zoo-jardin-plantes-2992 |date=2021-08-07 }} Site of the Jardin des Plantes (in English)</ref> It occupies the northeast side of the garden along the Quai St. Bernard, covering five hectares (13.6 acres). It was created between 1798 and 1836 as a home for the animals of the royal menagerie at Versailles, which were largely abandoned after the [[French Revolution]]. Its architecture features picturesque "fabriques", or pavilions, mostly created in the 19th century, to shelter the animals. In the 20th century the larger animals were moved to the [[Paris Zoological Park]], a more extensive site in the [[Bois de Vincennes]]. also governed by the National Museum of Natural History. The menagerie is currently home to about six hundred mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and invertebrates, representing about 189 species.<ref>Deligeorges, Gady, Labalette, "Le Jardin des Plantes et le Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle" (2004), p. 58</ref> These include the [[Amur leopard]] from China, one of the rarest cats on earth.

The museum has as its mission both research (fundamental and applied) and public diffusion of knowledge. It is organized into seven research and three diffusion departments.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.mnhn.fr/museum/foffice/transverse/transverse/accueil.xsp |title={{Lang|fr|Muséum national d'histoire naturelle|italic=no}}; official website |access-date=2008-02-16 |archive-date=2008-02-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080226074803/http://www.mnhn.fr/museum/foffice/transverse/transverse/accueil.xsp |url-status=live }}</ref>

The [[galerie de paléontologie et d'anatomie comparée|Gallery of Palaeontology and Comparative Anatomy]] and other parts of ''Jardin des Plantes'' was a source of inspiration for French graphic novelist [[Jacques Tardi]]. The gallery appears on the first page and several subsequent pages of ''{{lang|fr|Adèle et la bête}}'' (''Adèle and the Beast''; 1976), the first album in the series of ''{{lang|fr|[[Les Aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec]]}}''. The story opens with a 136-million-year-old [[pterodactyl]] egg hatching, and a live pterodactyl escaping through the gallery glass roof, wreaking havoc and killing people in Paris. (The Gallery of Palaeontology and Comparative Anatomy returned the favor by placing a life size cardboard cutout of Adèle and the hatching pterodactyl in a glass cabinet outside the main entrance on the top floor balcony.).

* 1793 to 1794 1793–1794: [[Louis Jean-Marie Daubenton]]

* 1794 to 1795 1794–1795: [[Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu]]

* 1795 to 1796 1795–1796: [[Bernard Germain de Lacépède|Bernard Germain Étienne de Laville-sur-Illon, comte de Lacépède]]

* 1796 to 1797 1796–1797: [[Louis Jean-Marie Daubenton]]

* 1797 to 1798 1797–1798: [[Louis Jean-Marie Daubenton]]

* 1798 to 1799 1798–1799: [[Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu]]

* 1799 to 1800 1799–1800: [[Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu]]

* 1800 to 1801 1800–1801: [[Antoine François, comte de Fourcroy|Antoine-François Fourcroy]]

* 1802 to 1803 1802–1803: [[René Desfontaines]]

* 1804 to 1805 1804–1805: [[Antoine François, comte de Fourcroy|Antoine-François Fourcroy]]

* 1806 to 1807 1806–1807: [[René Desfontaines]]

* 1808 to 1809 1808–1809: [[Georges Cuvier]]

* 1810 to 1811 1810–1811: [[René Desfontaines]]

* 1812 to 18131812–1813 : [[André Laugier]]

* 1814 to 18151814–1815 : [[André Thouin]]

* 1816 to 18171816–1817 : [[André Thouin]]

* 1818 to 18191818–1819 : [[André Laugier]]

* 1820 to 18211820–1821 : [[René Desfontaines]]

* 1822 to 18231822–1823 : [[Georges Cuvier]]

* 1824 to 18251824–1825 : [[Louis Cordier]]

* 1826 to 1827 1826–1827: [[Georges Cuvier]]

* 1828 to 1829 1828–1829: [[René Desfontaines]]

* 1830 to 1831 1830–1831: [[Georges Cuvier]]

* 1832 to 1833 1832–1833: [[Louis Cordier]]

* 1834 to 1835 1834–1835: [[Adrien de Jussieu]]

* 1836 to 1837 1836–1837: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]<ref>{{cite journal |journal=Night at}}</ref>

* 1838 to 1839 1838–1839: [[Louis Cordier]]

* 1840 to 1841 1840–1841: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1842 to 1843 1842–1843: [[Adrien de Jussieu]]

* 1844 to 1845 1844–1845: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1846 to 1847 1846–1847: [[Adolphe Brongniart]]

* 1848 to 1849 1848–1849: [[Adrien de Jussieu]]

* 1850 to 1851 1850–1851: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1852 to 1853 1852–1853: [[André Marie Constant Duméril]]

* 1854 to 1855 1854–1855: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1856 to 1857 1856–1857: [[Marie Jean Pierre Flourens]]

* 1858 to 1859 : [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1860 to 1861 1860–1861: [[Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire]]

* 1862 to 1863 1862–1863: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1863 to 1879 1863–1879: [[Michel Eugène Chevreul]]

* 1879 to 1891 1879–1891: [[Edmond Frémy]]

* 1891 to 1900 1891–1900: [[Alphonse Milne-Edwards]]

* 1900 to 1919 1900–1919: [[Edmond Perrier]]

* 1919 to 1931 1919–1931: [[Louis Mangin]]

* 1932 to 1936 1932–1936: [[Paul Lemoine]]

* 1936 to 1942 1936–1942: [[Louis Germain]]

* 1942 to 1949 1942–1949: [[Achille Urbain]]

* 1950 to 1950 : [[René Jeannel]]

* 1951 to 1965 1951–1965: [[Roger Heim]]

* 1966 to 1970 1966–1970: [[Maurice Fontaine (biologist)|Maurice Fontaine]]

* 1971 to 1975 1971–1975: [[Yves Le Grand]]

* 1976 to 1985 1976–1985: [[Jean Dorst]]

* 1985 to 1990 1985–1990: [[Philippe Taquet]]

* 1994 to 1999 1994–1999: [[Henry de Lumley]]

* 2002 to 2006 2002–2006: [[Bernard Chevassus-au-Louis]]

* 2006 to 2008 2006–2008: [[André Menez]] (deceased in February 2008)

* 2009 to 20152009–2015: [[Gilles Boeuf]]

* 2015 to present2015–2023: {{ill|Bruno David|fr}}

'''Gallery :captions :'''<br />

N The excavations of the [[Abri Pataud|Pataud shelter]], in Dordogne<br />.