Following Odysseus Not the end of the world Amarna city of light ...

Museumof the pieces were obtained duringa tour through England’s northerncounties that the two men undertookin 1599.The Trinity collection alsoincluded some 120 artefacts gatheredduring Captain James Cook’sfirst voyage to the Pacific. In manycases these were the first objectsobtained from the indigenous peoplesof the various islands and coastsvisited. Hence, while Cotton’s collectionreflected the inauguration ofserious inquiry into Roman Britain,the Cook collection marked thebeginnings of European interest inthe arts and peoples of the Pacific.It was not, however, the accumulationof collections in the collegesthat eventually gave rise to a3 4museum. The campaign to establishan institution was driven by membersof the Cambridge AntiquarianSociety, which had been establishedin 1840. The CAS was one of manylocal, typically county-based, historical,architectural, or archaeologicalsocieties created in theperiod. Members attended meetings,read papers and presentedgifts of books and specimens, whichbegan to accumulate, and there wasongoing anxiety about appropriatespace for the growing collection.Membership too grew dramaticallyin the 1870s and 1880s, and it wasover this period that the universitywas successfully lobbied to establisha museum for the CAS’s collections.At the same time, Sir ArthurHamilton Gordon sought to presentto the university a collection he hadmade as Governor of Fiji from 1875to 1880. Gordon was a Trinity man,the son of a Prime Minister, a formerPresident of the CambridgeUnion, and governor of severalother colonies before Fiji. Oneof his private secretaries, Alfred6 7252. Etching of themuseum made byTG Jackson, 1909.3. Palaeolithic flinthandaxe. Elveden,Suffolk. 13.2cm.4. Mesolithic red deerfrontlet. Star Carr,Yorkshire. 32cm.5. Late Iron Ageharness plates. Santon,Suffolk. 100 BC- AD 43.H. 8cm/7cm.6. Clay brick inscribedwith the name ofNebuchadnezzar II andunknown footprint.Babylon. 605-562BC.L 34cm.7. Cast of Mayan relief.AD 769-800. H. 88cm.Maudslay, later a pioneer of CentralAmerican archaeology, also wishedto donate a considerable number ofFijian artefacts.Not only these collections, but thenomination of a prospective curator,were pressed upon the university.Anatole von Hügel, of Englishand aristocratic Austrian parentage,had arrived in Fiji just beforeGordon and Maudslay. Young,enthusiastic, and open-minded, hequickly became passionately interestedin Fijian culture, got on wellwith the local people he encountered,and collected avidly.Von Hügel’s appointment wouldprove fortuitous. He worked enormouslyhard to build the collections.He was dedicated, charming,and persuasive, and won friends forthe new institution, among them SirJames Frazer, author of The GoldenBough, the famous early study ofmagic and religion, and AA Bevan,the wealthy Professor of Arabic,who funded many purchases. Hecorresponded extensively with travellersand others with ethnologicalinterests, encouraged them to makecollections for Cambridge, andbought pieces and collections fromdealers and auctions, very oftenwith his own money.Initially the museum was linkedwith no department or faculty.Though a Disney Professorshipin Archaeology had been establishedin 1851, the position washeld by Classicists and until the late1920s affiliated with the Faculty ofClassics. A few scholars, however,were excited by the emerging field43