El lunes 12 de diciembre de 9 a 14 horas se brindará el Seminario del proyecto RISE SciCoMove “Colecciones científicas en movimiento. Museos provinciales, archivos y practicas coleccionistas (1800–1950)” en el Auditorio Planta Baja de la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo.
El proyecto SciCoMove se centra en el estudio de los intercambios científicos transatlánticos con el objetivo de compartir ideas acerca de cómo se construye el conocimiento sobre las colecciones de los museos. Este proyecto ofrece una visión más compleja de la historia de las colecciones paleontológicas, antropológicas, entomológicas y botánicas de los museos de Europa y América Latina. Está dirigido por las Dras. Nathalie Richard, Universidad Le Mans, e Irina Podgorny, CONICET – Museo de La Plata.
En este seminario los investigadores extranjeros invitados serán: Cristiana Oghina-Pavie, (Universidad de Angers, Grupo TEMOS-FRE CNRS, Francia), Franck Laurent (Universidad de Le Mans, Francia), Alma Hanning (Universidad de Bonn, Alemania) y Amandine Pequignot (Museo Nacional de Historia Natural de Paris, Francia).
El seminario es gratuito,sin inscripción y será en español e inglés. Está organizado por el Archivo Histórico del Museo de La Plata y el Proyecto Rise SciCoMove, financiado por la Unión Europea a través de su programa Horizonte 2020 para la investigación e innovación científica y el subsidio Marie Sklodowska-Curie.
From the 4 to the 8 of July, the postgraduate course “HISTORIA NATURAL, COLECCIONES, ARCHIVOS Y MUSEOS. SIGLOS XIX Y XX” took place in the Museum of La Plata. As a PhD fellow at the Faculty of Natural Sciences, I enrolled. But honestly in the beginning I was only moved by how catchy I found the name and it´s affinity to my thesis topic. At that moment I wasn’t aware of the fact that the academic proposal had its origin in a SciCoMove workshop/training session. But the surprise could not have been more gratifying. The fusion of both opened the gates of the SciCoMove Project and allowed people with different backgrounds and from different points of Argentina to take a look at the work that’s currently being done within this project.
It was an intense week of hard work and exchanges. The course offered expositions and testimonies by professionals from different places like Switzerland, France, and Argentina. But, moreover, it was marked by the constant promotion of dialogue and exchange among everyone who was involved. And that included those of us who were taking it as a postgraduate course, the teachers, and the PhD student members of the SciCoMove Project. Being able to debate, share ideas, and co-create with people from different places and academic backgrounds, and who participate in projects like SciCoMove, represents a great opportunity of academic and professional growth.
Throughout the week, Irina, Susana and Natalie invited us to review the history of all museums as institutions, focusing in the particular case of the La Plata Museum, where we actually were. Being inside the museum was not a minor detail when breaking down it’s emergence story, and understanding that it is not as lineal and fluid as it is usually portrayed.
We wandered around the museum, and visited the exhibitions, the deposits, and the archive. For some this implied their first time in the museum and its guts. And for others like me, this meant a known place unveiling new connotations and possibilities. The study and analysis of collections, archives and objects that are or have been a part of the museums allows to revisit and rethink how the boundaries of the scientific field are and have been historically built. From that perspective the course proposed a guide to consider what (and who) are conceived inside those borders as well as how this is constantly being reshaped.
One of the things that blew my mind during the course was the idea of objects in museums and collections as artifacts. This is one of the pillars in which the SciCoMove project strands in order to tell how these objects have been moved around different places. I was familiar with the concept of artifact and its traditional application in archaeology. Artifact, as a concept is traditionally used in opposition of what is pristine and untouched. So, anything that has signs of being exposed to some kind of human work, becomes an artifact. Of course, all tools found in an archaeological context easily fit this classification. Now the interesting part comes when we define what is this “human work”, and how it impacts the objects.
Sometime ago a friend archaeologist had revealed to me that this concept had many more possibilities, as he implied in his work that the soils and strata where the archaeological objects were found could be seen as an artifact too. And I found this somehow related. Just as the soils, the “natural” objects often found in the museums are normally conceived just as a part of nature, portraited in the exhibitions, or safeguarded in the collections. Then, for example, we could think about a piece of dinosaur bone. It probably has been dug out, reconditioned after, placed in a particular place according to one particular bone structure, and displayed in a room charged with conjectures about it. All those procedures involve changes in the objects, even if they are meant for preservation. When thinking about it, to classify, arrange chronologically, restore, build up, and all other actions that take place when working within museums and collections are human work. The same goes to any type of object, no matter how “natural” or “cultural” we might think it is, from the point when an object becomes something collected, categorised, saved, etc. it begins to be conceptualised. And that is the key to start talking about artifacts, because to give meaning is one of the firsts and most basic human works.
From a historical perspective, with case-study examples and in line with the goal of the SciCoMove Project, the course aimed to make evident that when constructing scientific knowledge, no man nor woman of science acts alone. Neither in the past or present.
At the beginning of the week, Irina Podgorny insisted that we let aside the idiomatic barriers and size the situation to meet other people and even make friends. Following her advice, along the week we saw how the theoretical and conceptual talks slipped out of the classes and continued unto the bars. There´s no better empiric proof than that of what role company, assembly, and the collective play for the generation of knowledge.
Thereby, my bond with museums has a long history. Since I started studding anthropology in the Collage of Natural Sciences, which is associated with the Museum of La Plata. And now I am carrying out my PhD studies considering museums as spaces of science communication and heritage safeguard, and on how to problematize that, within the construction of scientific knowledge. With that in mind, participating of the course has been a very valuable and rewarding experience, especially considering the opportunity to get in touch with the SciCoMove Project.
I have a Bachelor´s Degree in Anthropology by the Facultad de Ciencias Naturales, Universidad Nacional de La Plata (UNLP), where I now also taught. In 2021 I got a University Diploma in Public Science Communication, by the UNICEN. Currently I am carrying out my PhD, working in the Laboratory of Applied Ethnography Investigations, and with a scholarship from the UNLP, under the tutoring of Gabriela Morgante (LINEA UNLP-CIC) and Mariano Bonomo (Dept. Arqueología, Museo de La Plata). My thesis centers on museums as places for the collective construction of knowledge and the heritage safeguard, and takes place in Molinos (Calchaquí Valleys, Salta)
Del 4 al 8 de Julio en el Museo de La Plata, se desarrolló el curso de posgrado “HISTORIA NATURAL, COLECCIONES, ARCHIVOS Y MUSEOS. SIGLOS XIX Y XX”. Como estudiante del doctorado en Ciencias Naturales de la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo, me inscribí al curso, honestamente impulsada sólo por lo llamativo del título y la afinidad con mi tema de estudio. Ignoraba, al momento, que partía de la propuesta de un taller y un curso de formación de SciCoMove con título homónimo. Pero la sorpresa no pudo haber sido más grata. La fusión de ambas instancias permitió a abrir las puertas de SciCoMove, y que personas con diferentes formaciones y de diferentes puntos de la Argentina pudiéramos dar un vistazo al trabajo que están realizando actualmente desde el proyecto.
Fue una ardua semana de trabajo e intercambios. El curso brindó exposiciones y testimonios de profesionales de diferentes lugares, como Suiza, Francia y Argentina. Pero, sobre todo, estuvo marcado el fomento del diálogo y el intercambio, entre todas las personas que participan. Y esto incluye a las personas que lo estábamos tomando como curso de posgrado, a las docentes a cargo y a los doctorandos de SciCoMove. Debatir, compartir ideas y construir con personas de otras formaciones, de otros lugares representa una gran oportunidad para el crecimiento personal y profesional.
A lo largo de los encuentros las docentes del curso nos invitaron a revisar la historia de los museos, en general, y tomando como caso particular el Museo de La Plata, donde además nos encontrábamos físicamente. Estar allí no resultó menor a la hora de desglosar el relato del surgimiento de este espacio, y comprender que no es tan lineal y fluido como a veces se lo presenta.
Pudimos recorrer el museo, las muestras, los depósitos y el archivo. Para algunos implicaba conocer por primera vez el Museo y sus entrañas, aunque para otros representaba un espacio ya conocido, cotidiano, o hasta nuestro espacio de trabajo, develando nuevas connotaciones y posibilidades. El estudio y análisis de colecciones, los archivos y los objetos que forman o han formado pate de museos permite rever y repensar cómo se construyen hoy en día, y cómo se han construido históricamente las fronteras del campo científico. Desde allí el curso nos proponía una guía para ver qué (y quiénes) se conciben dentro de estos límites, pero también cómo estos últimos se reformulan constantemente.
Uno de los aspectos que más me fascinó del curso fue la propuesta de concebir a los objetos, que se hallan en los museos, como artefactos. Este es uno de los pilares del Proyecto SciCoMove para el estudio del movimiento de estos objetos. Por mi formación de gado, estaba familiarizada con la aplicación más tradicional que el concepto artefacto posee para la arqueología. “Artefacto” suele usarse en oposición a lo que se piensa prístino e intacto. Así, cualquier cosa que presente signos de haber estado expuesto a algún tipo de trabajo -acción- humano, se convierte en artefacto. Las herramientas halladas en un contexto arqueológico, por supuesto que encajan fácilmente en esta clasificación. Ahora, la parte más interesante llega cuando intentamos definir qué es “acción humana”, y cómo impacta en los objetos.
Algún tiempo atrás, un amigo arqueólogo me había revelado que este concepto posee muchas más posibilidades, el mismo insinuaba en un trabajo que los suelos y los estratos donde se hallan los restos arqueológicos pueden ser vistos como artefactos también. Encuentro esto de alguna forma relacionado con lo que se planteaba en el curso. Como los suelos, los “objetos naturales” que comúnmente encontramos en los museos, suelen concebirse como una parte de la naturaleza expuestas en las muestras, o salvaguardadas en las colecciones. Podríamos, por ejemplo, pesar en un fragmento de hueso de dinosaurio entonces. Probablemente fue excavado, extraído, reacondicionado, colocado en una posición particular de a cuerdo a una estructura ósea particular, y presentado en una habitación, cargada con conjeturas sobre el mismo. Todos esos procedimientos involucran cambios en los objetos, incluso si persiguen fines de preservación. Al pensarlo, clasificar, ordenar cronológicamente, restaurar, reconstruir, y todo el resto de las acciones que se llevan a cabo con el trabajo en museos y con colecciones, son acciones puramente humanas. Y lo mismo aplica apara cualquier tipo de objeto, sin importar que tan “natural” o “cultural” creamos que sea, desde el momento en el que un objeto pasa a ser algo recolectado, categorizado, guardado, etc. pasa a estar conceptualizado. Y esa es la clave para empezar a hablar de artefactos, porque dar significado es una de las acciones humanas más básicas.
Desde una perspectiva histórica, con ejemplos de estudios de caso, y en línea con los objetivos del proyecto SciCoMove, el curso pretendía dejar, en evidencia que a la hora de construir conocimiento científico ningún hombre o mujer de ciencia actúa sólo. Ni en el pasado, ni hoy en día.
Al empezar la semana, Irina Podgorny (una de las docentes a cargo del curso) nos insistió en que dejáramos de lado las barreras idiomáticas y aprovecháramos la ocasión para conocer a otras personas y hasta incluso “hacernos amigos”. Siguiendo su consejo, vimos como lo largo de la semana, las charlas conceptuales y teóricas terminaban filtrándose fuera del aula y seguían en los bares. No hay mejor comprobante empírico que este del rol que juega lo colectivo, la compañía y el encuentro para la generación de conocimiento.
Mi relación con los museos se remonta ya a un tiempo atrás. Estudie la licenciatura en antropología en la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales de la UNLP, que está asociada al Museo de La Plata. Mi especialización en comunicación pública de la ciencia, influyó en que actualmente para mi doctorado me centre en y considere a los museos como espacios de comunicación de ciencia, además de salvaguarda del patrimonio, y sobre como problematizar esto en el marco de la construcción de conocimiento científico. Entendiendo esto, fue una experiencia muy valiosa y gratificante haber participado del curso, con la oportunidad de entrar en contacto del proyecto SciCoMove.
Estudié Antropología en la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata, donde actualmente soy docente. En 2022 terminé una Diplomatura universitaria en Comunicación Pública de la Ciencia, en la UniCen. Actualmente cuento con una beca doctoral de la UNLP, con lugar de trabajo en el Laboratorio de Investigaciones Etnográficas Aplicadas, bajo la dirección de Gabriela Morgante (LINEA UNLP-CIC) y la co-dirección de Mariano Bonomo (Diisión Arqueología, Museo de La Plata). Mi tesis se centra en los museos como espacios para comunicación y construcción colectiva de conocimiento, así como para la puesta en valor del patrimonio, en la localidad de Molinos (Valles Calchaquíes, Salta).
During the Training Session in La Plata in July 2022, its participants took part in a poster competition. Divided into five groups and given exciting topics to explore, as well as some guidelines on what constitutes a visually appealing poster, they embarked on the journey of concise writing and visual communication.
The results were varied and reflected vividly the creativity and imagination of each group. The same stands true for the discussions that followed the presentations of the posters. Choosing the winner was not easy and the elaborations lasted for much longer than the planned one hour. It was so difficult that it led to the jury renouncing on the idea of selecting only one winner so each poster was celebrated for its qualities and each group received congratulations from the teaching staff.
Among the many skulls and casts preserved in the anthropological collection of the Museum of La Plata, the cast skull numbered 1745 in the catalogue complied by then-director Robert Lehmann-Nitsche (1872-1938) in 1911, is of particular interest to learn more about the circulation of scientific knowledge and collections between Europe and America in the 19th century.
The story of the cast 1745 begins in France in December 1864, when a group of quarry workers began excavating on a hill in the Quiberon peninsula to extract stones. The hill of Manné-Beker-Noz, located near the village of Saint-Pierre (Morbihan, France), had been known to the local people since time immemorial for the dolmen that surmounted its crest. During the excavation of the site, the quarrymen found by chance a prehistoric tomb containing the skeletal remains of an adult male and a terracotta urn of large size (fig. 1). After being informed of the discovery, Alexandre Gressy, a member of the learned society of Morbihan, went to the site to study and collect the bones and the artifact. In this he was helped by the colleague René Galles, who drew sketches of the archeological finds.
Sketch of the tomb of Quiberon, «Bulletin de la Societé polymathique du Morbihan » (1865), p. 52.
The discovery was reported a few months later on the journal of the Societé polymathique du Morbihan by its president, the physician Gustave de Closmadeuc (1828-1918). In addition to being the chief surgeon of the Vannes hospital, Closmadeuc was also an avid archeologist. In his article he explained that the importance of the discovery consisted first of all in the good state of conservation of the Man of Quiberon, which would allow for a detailed anthropological examination. For this purpose, Closmadeuc had taken upon himself the task of putting together the different cranial fragments found in the tomb and sent the reconstructed skull to the Laboratory of Anthropology directed by Paul Broca in Paris for analysis:
«By dint of patience I managed to match and glue together most of the cranial fragments. I was thus able to reconstitute the head, which is currently in the hands of Mr. Broca and Mr. Follin […] who offered me their help. […] We will then leave it to our eminent colleagues to inform us about the anthropological value of the skull that we have entrusted to their examination» (Closmadeuc 1865, pp. 42-3).
Paul Broca (1824-1880), the most famous anthropologist of nineteenth century France, published the results of his analysis on both the «Bulletin of the Societé polymathique»and the Bulletin of the Society of Anthropology of Paris. Like Closmadeuc, Broca stressed the extraordinary significance of the archeological discovery in Quiberon. «My dear confrere», he wrote in a letter to Closmadeuc in June 1865, «The skull of Quiberon that you sent us is one of the most important remains of the Stone Age» (Broca 1865, p. 47). Most ethnologists and linguists of the time believed that, during the Stone Age, Europe had been populated by a backward and racially homogenous human group marked by the brachycephalic head shape. This group, scholars maintained, was later replaced by the more civilized Indo-Aryan people, whose skulls were dolicocephalic. The Quiberon skull, however, seemed to tell a very different story: «This skull is the most dolicocephalic of all the Stone Age skulls that have been found so far in France» Broca pointed out with surprise (fig. 2).
Figure 2. Cast skull of the Man of Quiberon preserved in the Museum of La Plata. The dolicocephalic shape of the head is clearly visible. Picture by Nathalie Richard.
Since archeological evidence suggested that the Man of Quiberon had enjoyed high social status, Broca decided to compare the measurements of his skull with those of 90 upper-class nineteenth century Parisians. He concluded that the Quiberon skull «bears, in relation to the average type of the modern French, many characteristics of inferiority similar to those which are present today in certain savage, or at least highly barbaric, races». For Broca, the shape of the Quiberon skull resembled that of «negroes and Neo-caledonians». In his works, he distinguished two types of dolicocephaly: the frontal dolicocephaly, found among the «Germanic races», and the occipital dolicocephaly, typical of «African and Oceanic races». The first was characterized by a highly developed frontal region and was therefore considered an indicator of high intelligence. The second, on the other hand, was marked by a highly developed occipital region at the back of the skull, which was believed to be the seat of instinct and therefore considered an indicator of a more primitive and animal mind.
By underlining its features of inferiority and characterizing its occipital dolicocephaly as primitive and African (and thus very different from the frontal dolicocephaly found among civilized people like Indo-Aryans), the French anthropologist tried to solve the contradiction that the Quiberon skull had exposed: the presence of early dolicocephalic skulls in Stone Age France. Rather than questioning the existing theories on the racial composition of prehistoric Europe, Broca resorted to the explanation that the Man of Quiberon belonged to a human group less racially evolved than Indo-Aryans.
The skull of Quiberon remained in Paris, where it became part of the collection of the Society of Anthropology. In 1874, however, a copy of it was sent to Buenos Aires. In fact, in that year Broca exchanged a number of specimens with the Argentinian amateur collector Francisco Pascasio Moreno (1852-1919), who he had never met in person but whom he knew through a mutual acquaintance with Carlos Germàn Burmeister (1807-1892), director of the National Museum of Natural History of Buenos Aires. Among the 15 casts that Broca sent to Argentina and that later became part of the collection of the Museum of La Plata was the Quiberon skull. The original specimen remained in France, probably to allow further studies of it. On his part, Moreno sent to Broca a series of Patagonian prehistoric skulls, although we do not know which ones and in what number. As a result of this exchange, Moreno was appointed correspondent of the Society of Anthropology of Paris and his article on the prehistoric cemeteries of Patagonia was published in its journal.
In conclusion, the (cast) skull of Quiberon tells us the story of specimens and ideas that travelled from both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and not just from the peripheries to the centers. It also shows how 19th century collecting practices were closely intertwined with racial theory and physical anthropology’s attempt to elaborate a racial hierarchy of the world’s population.
Figure 3. Picture by Nathalie Richard.
Selected sources and bibliography
Claude Blanckaert, De la race à l’évolution. Paul Broca et l’anthropologie française. 1850-1900, Paris, L’Harmattan, 2009.
Paul Broca, Étude anthropologique du crane de Manné-Beker-Noz, «Bulletin de la Societé polymathique du Morbihan » (1865), pp. 47-49.
Gustave Closmadeuc, Tombeau découvert au Manné-Beker-Noz, Bulletin de laSocieté polymathique du Morbihan (1865), pp. 39-46.
Máximo Farro, La formación del Museo de La Plata. Coleccionistas, comerciantes, estudiosos y naturalistas viajeros a fines del siglo XIX, Rosario, Prohistoria, 2009.
Chris Manias, Race, Science, and the Nation. Reconstructing the Ancient Past in Britain, France and Germany, Abingdon, Routledge, 2013.
Irina Podgorny, Margaret Lopes, El desierto en una vitrina. Museos e historia natural en la Argentina, Mexico, Limusa, 2008 (2e éd., Rosario, Prohistoria, 2014).
Nathalie Richard, Travelling skulls. About some skulls and casts kept in the storerooms of the Museum of La Plata, 2022, https://scicomove.hypotheses.org/959
By Amandine Péquignot, Maître de conférences du Muséum, MNHN (Paris)
“Bicho” defines in Spanish a small animal, especially insect, but also a person. In Argentina, a “bicho raro” describes a man of alert and insightful intelligence.
Caras y Caretas (Argentina), 19 de octubre de 1900, n°107
Friedrich Wilhelm Karl Berg, better known by the name of Carlos Berg (1843-1902) could be a “bicho raro” by being an entomologist who was out of the ordinary for his way of preparing his collection and a sharp person whose movement between Europe, Argentina and Uruguay we can follow thanks to his collections left and his particular technique of preparation and arrangement of specimens. Berg were among the most important and influential zoologists in Argentina.
Born in Tukums (current-day Latvia), having worked a few years in trade and being librarian, Berg moved in 1865 to Riga where he became curator of the entomological department of the Riga Museum and then teacher in natural history and chemistry at the Technical Preparatory School of the Baltic Polytechnic in Riga.at the Riga Technical University. Around 1872, he was called by Carlos Burmeister, director of the museum of natural history in Buenos Aires (Argentina), who searched for entomologists to fill the new position of inspector at the Public Museum. A few years later, he became a professor of biology at the Faculty of Physical and Natural Sciences of the National College of Buenos Aires. In 1892, Berg succeeded the late Burmeister as director of the Museum. Within this establishment, Berg took part in the expansion of many collections including in entomology.
Between 1875 and 1901, Berg described and named over 21 genera and 122 species of Lepidoptera. One of the most important Lepidoptera publication was “Lepidopteros patagónicos observados en el viaje de 1874” (1875).
In 1906, the entomologistCarlos Bruch (1869-1943), at the time in charge of the zoology section and greatly influenced by Berg, informed about the selling of Berg’s private collection, among others, his entomological collection (Source : MLP archives). The Museo de La Plata bought the collection which represented around the 10 000 specimens and 590 types nowadays.
In answer to the ladybug’s caricature in Caras y Caretas, we took as exemple a Exoplectra fulgurata (Berg, 1874) presented in the MLP’s entomological collection to illustrate Berg’s labelling.He developed a very personal and distinctive practice for organizing and labeling his collection as we observed for ichthyologic specimens preserved in fluid at the MACN (Chiaramonte and Péquignot, 2019) which today allows them to be clearly identified or also recognized when the collection has been revised by him. As well in entomology, Berg wrote himself his label (recognize of the typical “B” of Berg), the type status of the specimens was reported by a tiny label framed in red with “Typus” printed in red, the Latin name was written on a tiny label with red framed when it was a typus specimen, the locality – was typed on a tiny green label -when it is in Argentina.
Since from 1890 to 1892, Berg was director of the National Museum of natural history in Montevideo (Uruguay), we may follow el “bicho raro” other way too…
This bust is inspired by the fossil recovered in 1856 in the Feldhofer cave, in the Neander Valley (Germany). It is one of the first Neanderthal specimens which informed the representation of the Cave Man in the imaginary of the 19th century. This fossil – vault fragments, with a great development of the supraorbital torus, and fragments of postcranial bones – intervened in the first controversy around human evolution in which transformist intellectuals disputed against those who adopted creationist and catastrophist perspectives. The former interpreted in this specimen a race antecedent to a period of the Germans and Celts; the second, a modern individual who suffered from some physical or mental disease that deformed his skull.
According to Brian Regal (2004), the images about life in prehistory had an immediacy and a power that rocks and fossils could not. Thus, museums included visual representations -scientific or supposedly scientific- about evolution, such as sculptures, drawings, paintings, and dioramas, sometimes derived from scientific spaces, or from spaces more linked to popular culture. They were destined to satisfy the interest of an audience curious to know phenomena distanced in time and space. Judith Berman (1999) suggests that an iconographic history was built around the Cave Man where characteristics such as the long and wild hair and the hairy body were visual signifiers that constituted our ancestors as “Not Us” or “Not Quite Us”, and those signifiers were associated with connotations of primitivism, animal behaviour, amorality, perversion, and madness; qualities also attributed to the natural world. The individual represented in the bust, in addition to the hirsute body, has a frown, red eyes, and shows his teeth, signs associated with aggressiveness and anger.
This sculpture (height of 54.6 cm) is housed at the División Antropología of the La Plata Museum (Argentina) and was exhibited for decades together with other plaster casts representing the Fossil Man. It was sold at the end of nineteenth century by the Ward’s Natural Science Establishment, in Rochester (United States) with a price of 7 (white) to 8 (bronzed) dollars. The Catalogue promotional text stated: “This bust is an ideal restoration, based upon the famous “Neanderthal skull,” found in 1857 in the Neanderthal, near Düsseldorf, Rhenish Prussia. Prof. Huxley says of the skull: “First, that its extraordinary form is due to a natural conformation hitherto not known to exist, even in the most barbarous races. Secondly, that it belongs to a period antecedent to the time of the Celts in Germany, and was in all probability derived from one of the wild races of north-western Europe. Thirdly, that it is beyond doubt traceable to a period at which the diluvium still existed.” As an effort to represent a Primitive Man, this bust is of interest to Archaeologists, and finds a very appropriate place over a case or cabinet of archaeological relics.” (p. 77).
Bibliography
Berman, Judith C. 1999. Bad Hair Days in the Paleolithic: Modern (Re)Constructions of the Cave Man. American Anthropologist. 101(2): 288-304.
Regal, Brian. 2004. Human evolution. A guide to the Debates. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, Inc.
Ward’s Natural Science Establishment, inc. 1893. Catalogue of human skeletons, human and comparative anatomical models, botanical models, busts and masks. 6th ed. Rochester, N.Y.: Ward’s Natural Science Establishment.
Este busto está inspirado en el fósil hallado en 1856 en la cueva Feldhofer, en el valle del Neander (Alemania). Es uno de los primeros ejemplares de Neandertal y comenzó a representar en el imaginario del siglo XIX al Hombre de las Cavernas. Este fósil – fragmentos de calota, con un gran desarrollo del torus supraorbitario, y fragmentos de huesos postcraneales- intervino en la primera controversia en torno de la evolución humana en la que intelectuales transformistas confrontaron a quienes adherían al creacionismo y al catastrofismo. Los primeros interpretaban en este espécimen una raza anterior a la de los germanos y celtas; los segundos, un individuo moderno que sufría alguna enfermedad física o mental que había dejado marcas en su cráneo.
Según Brian Regal (2004), las imágenes acerca de la vida en la prehistoria tuvieron una inmediatez y un poder que las rocas y los fósiles no lograron. Por eso, los museos incorporaron representaciones visuales -científicas o pretendidamente científicas- sobre la evolución, como esculturas, dibujos, pinturas y dioramas, surgidos a veces en los propios espacios del saber, o en espacios más vinculados a la cultura popular. Estaban destinados a satisfacer el interés de un público curioso por conocer aquello que estaba distante en el tiempo y en el espacio. Judith Berman (1999) sugiere que en torno del Hombre de las Cavernas se construyó una historia iconográfica en donde características como el cabello largo y salvaje y el cuerpo peludo fueron un significante visual que constituyeron a nuestros ancestros como “No nosotros” o “No del todo nosotros” y a dicho significante se le asociaron connotaciones de primitivismo, comportamiento animal, amoralidad, perversión y locura; cualidades atribuidas también al mundo natural. El individuo representado en el busto, además del cuerpo hirsuto, tiene el ceño fruncido, ojos enrojecidos y muestra sus dientes, señales asociadas a la agresividad y enojo.
Esta escultura (54,6 cm de altura) se encuentra conservada en la División Antropología del Museo de La Plata (Argentina) y estuvo durante décadas exhibida junto a otros moldes de yeso en representación del Hombre Fósil. Era vendida a fines del siglo XIX por el Ward’s Natural Science Establishment de Rochester (Estados Unidos) con un precio de 7 (blanca) a 8 (bronceada) dólares. El texto de promoción en el Catálogo de venta indicaba: “Este busto es una restauración ideal, basada en el famoso ‘cráneo Neanderthal’, hallado en 1857 en Neanderthal, cerca de Dusseldorf, Rhenish Prussia. El Prof. Huxley dice del cráneo: “Primero, que su extraordinaria forma es debida a una conformación natural que hasta ahora no se sabía que existía, aún en las más bárbaras razas. Segundo, que pertenece a un período antecedente al tiempo de los celtas en Alemania y fue con toda probabilidad derivado de una raza salvaje del noroeste de Europa. Tercero, que es sin duda fácil de ubicar en un período en que el diluvio todavía existía.” En un esfuerzo por representar al Hombre primitivo, este busto es de interés para los arqueólogos, y encuentra un lugar apropiado en una caja o gabinete de reliquias arqueológicas.” (p. 77).
Bibliografía
Berman, Judith C. 1999. Bad Hair Days in the Paleolithic: Modern (Re)Constructions of the Cave Man. American Anthropologist. 101(2): 288-304.
Regal, Brian. 2004. Human evolution. A guide to the Debates. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, Inc.
Ward’s Natural Science Establishment, inc. 1893. Catalogue of human skeletons, human and comparative anatomical models, botanical models, busts and masks. 6th ed. Rochester, N.Y.: Ward’s Natural Science Establishment.
En la segunda mitad del siglo XIX y mucho antes de la manía por los dinosaurios, todo museo que se preciara debía contar con, al menos, una coraza de gliptodonte, un animal extraño, acorazado y de dimensiones gigantescas que, desde 1839 formaba parte del catálogo de los gigantescos mamíferos fósiles procedentes de la América del Sur.
Los primeros en viajar llegaron en la década de 1840 a las colecciones del Royal College of Surgeons de Londres y, a partir de allí, no hubo museo del hemisferio norte o del sur que no deseara o comisionara el envío de semejante portento. En Londres, Richard Owen los llamó Glyptodon, un nombre genérico que remarcaba la forma esculpida de sus dientes, la pieza en la que basó su existencia.
El esqueleto y, sobre todo, su cubierta, no eran fácil de transportar: aunque la coraza apareciera con todas o casi todas sus piezas, una vez extraída de la tierra, la coraza se partía en cientos de pedazos. Se pagaban caro y los proveedores de especímenes debieron ingeniársela, inventar maneras para que lo que se desarmaba en las pampas se volviera a unir del otro lado del mar o donde fuera que se instalara. Una de las soluciones consistió en concebir el caparazón como una suerte de mosaico pompeyano: numerado en el papel y en cada una de sus piezas, se lo enviaba desarmado para que las placas (tesserae), una vez en el gabinete y con una gran inversión de tiempo y trabajo, se pudieran recomponer en su forma ideal. Los gliptodontes que hoy vemos son el resultado de la anatomía comparada y de ese trabajo artesanal que combina las prácticas de la carpintería, la herrería y la albañilería.
Sin embargo, una vez montados, pegados con cola y sostenidos por estructura de metal o de madera, la fragilidad del montaje no desaparecía: gracias a la misma, el director del Museo Público de la ciudad de Buenos Aires (entonces capital de provincia y no de la nación), en 1883 apeló a esa característica para argumentar la imposibilidad de mudar las colecciones a otro edificio, a otra ciudad. Los gliptodontes, una vez armados, se hacían sedentarios y servían para negociar espacios, cargos y presupuestos.
A fines del siglo XIX el Museo de La Plata, museo general de la nueva capital de la provincia de Buenos Aires establecida en 1882, a falta de uno, instalaba un tren, una verdadera manifestación de la variedad de los esqueletos acorazados que la provincia podía ofrecer al mundo. Con ello no solo demostraba la riqueza de las pampas: le enrostraba al pequeño y algo vetusto museo de la capital de la Nación- ahora Museo Nacional, las dimensiones que la exhibición de la naturaleza podía adquirir en las nuevas instituciones de la provincia.
Mientras tanto, el gliptodonte llevaba medio siglo de vida como espécimen de museo y poblaba, entero o en pedazos, las salas, las colecciones y los depósitos de los museos de varias decenas de ciudades de todo el mundo. Esta foto y estas palabras son una invitación a revisar las vitrinas más cercanas para constatar su presencia y trazar los caminos del gliptodonte en los museos del mundo.
In the second half of the 19th century and long before the dinosaur craze, every self-respecting museum had to have at least one glyptodon carapace, a mighty, armoured animal of gigantic dimensions that since 1839 was part of the catalogue of strange and gigantic fossil mammals coming from South America.
The first one arrived in the collections of the Royal College of Surgeons in London in the 1840s, and from then on there was no museum in the northern or southern hemisphere that did not wish and commission such a wonder. In London, Richard Owen called them Glyptodont, a generic name that emphasized the sculpted shape of their teeth, the element on which he based their existence.
The skeleton, and above all its shell, were not easy to transport: even if the carapace appeared with all or almost all its pieces, once extracted from the ground, it could break into hundreds of fragments. They were expensive, and the dealers of natural history specimens had to find a way to make what was disassembled in the pampas come together again on the other side of the ocean, or wherever it was installed. One of the solutions consisted in conceiving the carapace as a sort of Pompeian mosaic: numbered on paper and in each of its pieces, it was sent disassembled so that the plates (tesserae), once in the cabinet and with a great investment of time and work, could be recomposed in their ideal form. The glyptodonts we see today are the result of comparative anatomy and of the craftsmanship that combines the practices of carpentry, blacksmithing, and masonry.
However, once assembled, glued, and supported by a metal or wooden structure, the fragility of the assembly did not disappear. Thanks to this, in 1883, the director of the Public Museum of the city of Buenos Aires (then the capital of the province and not of the nation) invoked this fact to argue the impossibility of moving the collections to another building or another city. The glyptodonts, once armed, became sedentary and served to negotiate spaces, positions, and budgets.
At the end of the 19th century, the Museo de La Plata, the main museum of the new capital of the province of Buenos Aires established in 1882, for the lack of one installed a train, a true manifestation of the variety of armoured skeletons that the province could offer to the world. By doing so, it not only demonstrated the richness of the pampas: it showed the small and somewhat old-fashioned museum in the capital of the nation – now Museo Nacional – the dimensions that the exhibition of nature could acquire in the new institutions of the province.
Meanwhile, the glyptodont had been living for half a century as a museum specimen and populated, whole or in pieces, the halls, collections, and deposits of museums in dozens of cities around the world. This photo and these words are an invitation to review the nearest showcases to verify its presence and trace the paths of the glyptodont in world museums.