Etymology and Educational Implication of the Term of ‘Museum(博物館)’ in Europe and East Asia

Suh, Won-Joo

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to examine the educational implication in the term, ‘museum(博物館)’, in Europe and East Asia. This paper endeavours to trace the etymological history of the terms respectively. In Europe, the ‘museum’ was originated from ‘Mouseion (Μουσειόν)’, the ancient Greek temple where art objects were known to be displayed. In the Roma era, this term was translated into Latin as ‘Museum’. Given that the Roman Museum played a different role from current museums, the term is more an etymological origin rather than the functional origin of the modern institution. However, the Greco-Roman ‘museums’ had an educational role such as teaching and research which is common to the museum of today. During the Renaissance, the term, museum, started to be related to the collection of art works, and, the Ashmolean Museum in the seventeenth century England became the first example of using the term as a modern institutional concept.

On the other hand, ‘Bakmoolgwan(博物館, museum)’, the
term commonly used in Korea, China and Japan, was originated from Japan in 1860 and introduced in Korea in 1876 by Ki‐Soo Kim in his book, “the Observation Report (修信使日記)”. However, the word ‘Bakmool(博物)’ was originated from the Chinese ancient literatures such as “Chun Qiu Zuo Dian (春秋左傳)”. The word ‘Bakmool(博物)’ is a combination of two words ‘extensive (博)’ and ‘matter (物)’; however, the whole word tends to mainly refer to ‘wide knowledge’ than ‘many objects’ in Chinese and Japanese. In other words, the core concept of the word ‘Bakmool (博物)’ would be ‘knowledge’ rather than ‘objects’. Therefore, given the etymology of the term, museum (博物館) should be understood in relation to knowledge than objects and the role of the museum should be emphasised in regard to ‘research and education’ rather than ‘the collection’.

Citation

Suh, W.-J. (2007). Etymology and Educational Implication of the Term of ‘Museum(博物館)’ in Europe and East Asia. Bagmulgwan gyo-yug yeon-gu, 1, 65-84

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Dec 1, 2007
• Deposit Date: Jul 12, 2010
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 17, 2025
• Print ISSN: 1976-622X
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 1
• Pages: 65-84
• Keywords: museum, 박물관, 博物館, Bakmool, 博物, etymology, education, knowledge, history, Europe, East Asia, Mouseion, Korea, China, Japan, Alexandria, Greece, Rome, museum education,
• Publisher URL: http://musedu.org/
• Related Public URLs: http://www.facebook.com/wonjoo.suh