Ancient Egypt Magazine
Volume Three Issue Six -- May/June 2003
The Wilbour Library of Egyptology:
A
Vital Resource
Comparatively few of the visitors to The Brooklyn Museum of Art, even
those whose primary purpose is to peruse the splendours of the Egyptian
galleries, are aware that the Museum also houses an Egyptological jewel of a
very different variety, namely the Wilbour Library of Egyptology. Patrick F.
Houlihan has good reason to praise an institution with a distinct dedication
to aiding Egyptological research.
Situated on the third floor, this renowned
research facility is certainly the finest of its kind in the western hemisphere,
perhaps even the world over. Its holdings are currently approaching 50,000
volumes devoted to ancient Egypt. The collection encompasses every imaginable
aspect of this stimulating, but highly specialized area of study: art,
architecture, archaeology, philology, cultural history, literature, religion,
travellers’ accounts, works of fiction, Coptology, Egyptomania, etc., ranging
from early Predynastic times up to the Islamic Period. In addition, there are
many hundreds of scholarly titles and periodicals pertaining to the
civilizations with whom people of the Nile Valley had interconnections, such as
those located in western Asia, the Sudan, Greece, and Rome.
The Wilbour Library’s annual acquisitions do not stop with the printed
word, but include up-to-date technological innovations to facilitate modern
research methods demanded in the twenty-first century. At the present time, the
staff is working on the implementation of a new library management system, which
in a short while will allow internet access to the full catalogue. As part of
the major BMA Renovation Project now underway at the Museum, the Wilbour Library
is also slated to be entirely remodelled in the not too distant future. These
exciting new changes will undoubtedly carry on the distinguished legacy of the
man whose name the Library bears. The BMA will be presenting an exhibit, ‘Egypt
Through Other Eyes: Images from the Wilbour Library of Egyptology,’ in
conjunction with the opening on April 12th, 2003 of expanded galleries of
ancient Egyptian antiquities at The Brooklyn Museum of Art.
The central theme of the exhibition is to reveal how ancient Egypt was
represented through Western eyes by means of an assortment of publications, from
costly elephant-sized folios with coloured engravings to mass produced works for
a broader audience. It will run from April 2003 for approximately one year in
two segments chronicling ‘Early Travel and Exploration’, and the ‘Popularization
of Egypt’.
The nucleus of the Wilbour Library of Egyptology derives from the personal
library of the American journalist and independent Egyptologist, Mr. Charles
Edwin Wilbour (1833-1896), originally of Little Compton, Rhode Island, who
between 1880 and 1896, spent the winter months with his family travelling and
passionately studying the monuments of Egypt. Then, in 1886, Mr. Wilbour
purchased the grand dahabiya (houseboat), The Seven Hathors, and sailed on the
River Nile with his fabulous volumes on board. Even nowadays, this would be an
enviable arrangement for an Egyptologist working in the field, to have one’s
reference materials so close at hand, not to mention the creature comforts of a
floating home. His collection contained all of the most important publications
on the subject right up until the time of his death, including a tremendous
number of offprints of articles from journals and festschriften presented
to him by the leading experts of the period. Many of the books from the library
of the eminent German Egyptologist, Karl Richard Lepsius (1810-1884), also made
their way into Mr. Wilbour’s possession.
ANCIENT
EGYPT
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