Manchester Memoirs, Vol. Ixif, (191 7) No. 3 9 



the war. The site and the plan should be decided without further 

 delay. We can see then how far our present collections can be enlarged, 

 and supplemented by private benefactors, and we can prepare the 

 collections for their places in the new buildings. The preliminary work 

 in the Manchester Museum occupied ten years, and the organisation 

 of the new galleries will not be completed in a short time. 



VI. — Organisation of Collections for the New 

 Art Gallery. 



The scheme for the organisation of an Art Gallery in a new central 

 institution, adopted by the Art Gallery Committee in 1902, is sufficiently 

 wide to cover the whole field of Ancient and Modern Art. It consists 

 of the following sections : — 



Section I. Egyptian and Assyrian. — The Egyptian collection 

 now in the Manchester Museum, places the study of Egyptian Art and 

 life within the reach of the public. It therefore need not be duplicated 

 here. It would not be difficult to add to the Egyptian collection 

 specimens and casts sufficient to illustrate Assyria. The Assyrian 

 Art is however so closely allied to Persian that it would go naturally 

 into Section III. 



Section II. Myken^an, Greek and Roman. — The explora- 

 tions by Schlieman in Troy, and Evans' work in Crete, have revealed 

 the presence of a high civilisation in the Eastern Mediterranean, 

 ranging backwards from the 12th to at least 25th century B.C., with 

 an influence extending westwards through Italy and Spain, eastwards 

 into Asia Minor, and northwards over the greater part of Europe. It 

 is indigenous and quite separate from that of Egypt, although there 

 were close commercial relations. It is from Mykensean art that the 

 Greeks got their inspiration. The scenes illustrating the hunting and 

 taming of the great wild ox, the Urus, done in repousse, on two golden 

 cups, found in a tomb at Vaphio in Sparta, and the well-modelled 

 bulls on the walls of the palace at Knossos, and the pose of the ivory 

 statuette found at the latter place, indicate beyond all doubt the source 

 of the highest type of Greek Art. We have the nucleus of a Myken- 

 aean collection in the admirable facsimiles now stored in the Whitworth 

 Institution. It would not be difficult to develop this into a series that 

 would go into its natural place next to the Greek and Roman groups, 

 and be of equal value to the students of art, and of history. 



Section III. Eastern or Oriental. — The third, or Oriental 

 Section will illustrate the sources from which so many of the designs 

 used in the West have been derived. It should include Chinese, Japanese, 

 Burmese and Siamese art, as well as that of India, Assyria, and Persia. 

 We have still much to learn from the East, and it is specially important 

 that we should learn as quickly as possible, when we consider the drift 



