ABSTRACT
Cabinets of curiosities dating from the late-fifteenth through the mid-seventeenth centuries are generally considered to be the precursor to the modern museum. While the European practice of designating a place for collection storage can be traced to the Catholic church of the medieval era, the scope and organizational structure and purpose of collecting expanded during the Renaissance era. Members of royal families amassed extensive collections intended to represent the whole world in microcosm as well as the prestige of the princely collector, whereas scholars collected specimens for the purpose of academic analysis or scientific experiment. By the mid-seventeenth, the contents of many cabinets of curiosities collections had been sold or dispersed, and their contents are known today through the published inventories and catalogs that collectors had created or commissioned.
