AUGUST 2012 marks nine decades of the museum movement in Nigeria
which started in 1922, with Esie museum, being the first to be
established in 1945 by the colonists.
Museum is described as an institution, building or room for storing,
preserving and exhibiting artistic, cultural, historical or scientific
objects. The term, Museum is derived from the Greek word “museion:
which means abode of muses. Muses were the daughters of Zeus, the kind
of the Olympian deities.
Since they were very good at singing and dancing, they helped men to
forget their cares and concerns of life’s challenges or their sorrows
and anxiety through these activities. Hence, “museion” came to be
associated with a place where man’s mind found rest and aloofness from
day-to-day affairs of life.
Muses were also credited with a great deal of imagination,
inspiration and infinite memory. They were spirits that are thought to
inspire poets or other artists. Thus, apart from being a place where
man’s mind found rest and aloofness, “Museion” also was associated with
learning of encyclopaedic character .
Owing to the encyclopaedic nature of this institution, the early
museums tried to hoard virtually everything that contributed to
knowledge and learning. For example, the Museum at Alexandria contained
statues of thinkers, votive donations, astronomical and surgical
instruments, elephant tusks as well as rare animals among others.
Museum has indeed been a research institution or centre of learning
right from time extending back beyond memory or record. It could be
recollected that Karl Marx, a revolutionary leader, social philosopher
and political economist in London after 1850, who became the founder of
modern socialism, used the British Museum and Library to write his
famous Des- Capital which shook the world to its foundation.