Antiquities in Airdrie Burgh 1895–2021

exploring museum history through collections

Abstract

North Lanarkshire Council Museums is the latest custodian of some of the founding collections of the Airdrie Burgh Museum, which was established in 1895 and closed in 1974. These reflect the wide-ranging interests of their original collectors, encompassing geology, natural history, ethnography and archaeology. This paper focuses on a collection of Mediterranean antiquities which survives today from the establishment of the museum. It results from a project funded by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland to investigate this collection, and demonstrates that it can be used to examine the museum’s development and changing ethos over the intervening period. Although they were initially keenly sought after and welcomed as valuable gifts, later curators found little use for such objects in streamlined displays focused on local history and culture. Now, curatorial networks and the affordances of digital technology allow such collections of antiquities to be researched and shared with both local and wider audiences, while they can also contribute to local, national and global histories of archaeology, collection and display.