COLLECTIONS OF OBJECTS OF RELIGIOUS CEREMONIAL 

 IN THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



By Immanuel Moses Casanowicz 



Assistant Curator, Division of Old World Archeology, United States National 



Museum 



I 

 INTRODUCTION 



The Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution in 1847 laid 

 out a comprehensive program in all the departments of human knowl- 

 edge and endeavor capable of representation by collections. They 

 included in the ethnological section religions as one of the subjects 

 suitable for museum collections. During the course of years objects 

 pertaining to religious cults formed a considerable part of the series. 

 In exhibiting its material the Museum adopted the plan of treating 

 special subjects independently of areas or national hmitations in 

 order to show the history of given ideas. 



In 1890 the question was taken up of the possibility of applying 

 such treatment to religion, a subject important in the history of 

 humanity. There was doubt, however, in the minds of many as to 

 whether the abstract ideas which group themselves about the word 

 "religion" could be adequately or even fairly portrayed through 

 ceremonial objects, numerous as they might be. Two members of the 

 staff were instructed, while abroad, to examine into this subject, with 

 the result that, in 1891, it was decided to secure objects of religious 

 ceremony with the view primarily to exhibit them at the World's 

 Columbian Exposition in Chicago, and ultimately with the intention 

 of bringing them together for installation in the United States National 

 Museum. 



At that time the tendency of museums abroad, and somewhat 

 among the students of the history of religions generally, was to deal 

 only with the reUgious practices and ideas of the barbarous nations, 

 and to treat but sparingly those of the more civilized and cultivated 

 nations of the earth. It was determined, in taking up the subject 

 here, to adopt a course contrary to that hitherto followed, and to 

 endeavor, from the educational point of view, to interest the people 

 in the history of religion by leading them to the unknown, as it were, 



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