Creepy and Kooky, and All Together Ooky
In 16th and 17th century Europe, people with means (and a bit of a quirky side) began building collections of objects to wow their friends. I’m not talking stamps and coins here. They amassed collections of things such as ancient artifacts, weaponry, coral and shells, globes, exotic plant and animal specimens, bell jars containing rare objects or miniature scenes, manmade oddities such as mermen, and even human body parts. Their goal was not just to own the objects, but to also to display them, so they created what became known as a cabinet of curiosities or wunderkammer (room of wonder).
Some collectors took themselves quite seriously, carefully identifying and verifying each object, even making scientific labels, or grouping items into categories. A few of these folks had actual cred as apothecaries, botanists, or anatomists, but many were simply aristocrats who could afford to buy whatever amused them.
What started as a small cabinet containing a few natural and manmade objects often became a large cabinet with many drawers, shelves, and compartments, brimming with specimens. Some collections grew so massive, they occupied entire rooms. Objects were hung on walls and even from the ceiling. If you’re visualizing a museum, you’re on the right track. This odd hobby, which first became popular during the Renaissance and reached a pinnacle of popularity in the Victorian era, led to the creation of the modern museum.
From Medici to Museum
In the mid-1600s, a father and son (both named John Tradescant), who were employed by the wealthy Earl of Salisbury, travelled the world known to Europeans, shipping back exotic botanical, geological, and zoological specimens as well as manmade objects they found. Their treasures ranged from “Powhatan’s mantle,” a large deer-hide with shell beadwork that was said to have belonged to Pocahantas’s father, to the stuffed body of a dodo. The collection was later acquired by wealthy antiquary Elias Ashmole, who donated it to the University of Oxford, where it became the Ashmolean Museum, Britain’s first public museum and the world’s first university museum in 1683.
Some of the most famous museum collections in Europe evolved out of cabinets of curiosity owned by individuals. These include the British Museum (from the collection of physician Hans Sloane); Russia’s first museum, the Kunstkamera, (from Peter the Great’s cabinet of curiosities); the Uffizi Gallery in Florence (from the personal collection of Cosimo Medici); and the Prado in Madrid, (from the Charles III of Spain Natural History Cabinet).
From Curious to Macabre
Frederik Ruysch (1638-1731) was a Dutch botanist and anatomist who developed techniques for preserving anatomical specimens. He used this skill to create a cabinet of curiosities that included human body parts, preserved organs, and exotic birds. He is best remembered today for his fanciful tableaux featuring human fetal skeletons and other bits of human remains.
His daughter made lovely miniature cuffs and collars that could be slipped onto the tiny arms and necks. These little skeletons were portrayed crying into handkerchiefs, wearing strings of pearls, or playing the violin.
According to Steven Jay Gould in his book Finders, Keepers: Eight Collectors: “Ruysch made about a dozen tableaux, constructed of human fetal skeletons with backgrounds of other body parts, on allegorical themes of death and the transiency of life…. Ruysch built the ‘geological’ landscapes of these tableaux from gallstones and kidneystones, and ‘botanical’ backgrounds from injected and hardened major veins and arteries for ‘trees,’ and more ramified tissue of lungs and smaller vessels for ‘bushes’ and ‘grass.’”
From Curiosities to Queeriosities
In 2017, the Centre International D’Art Contemporain de Montréal presented LGBTQ+ Cabinets of Curiosities. The cabinets showcased life stories of individuals and groups linked to LGBTQ+ sexuality. The public was invited to open cabinet drawers to examine works, artifacts, archive documents from community organizations, photos, publications, and personal testimonies.
The GLBT Historical Society’s Art and Artifacts Collection includes a diverse collection of two-dimensional and three-dimensional objects, and their online exhibition, Queeriosities: Treasures from the Art and Artifacts Collection, features their own cabinet of curiosities. Visit it here: glbthistory.org/queeriosities.
Want to Make Your Own Curiosity Cabinet?
In our area, an easy way to start a collection is by beachcombing. Gather not only shells, stones, and other natural objects, but also manmade items that wash up. Thrift stores are great places to find bell jars, glass apothecary jars, and even glass-fronted cabinets, as well as unusual items such as antique household objects, miniatures, old game pieces, buttons, etc.
Intrigued by biological specimens? Check out the Mütter Museum in Philadelphia, which displays its “beautifully preserved collections of anatomical specimens, models, and medical instruments in a nineteenth-century ‘cabinet museum’ setting.” You can also find biological specimens and oddities on Etsy. Let your curiosity be your guide. ▼
Nancy Sakaduski is an award-winning writer and editor who owns Cat & Mouse Press in Lewes, Delaware.
Images opposite page, L-R, Cabinet of Curiosities, Domenico Remps, c. 1690, Museo dell’Opificio delle Pietre Dure; Ruysch image #16, Courtesy of the New York Academy of Medicine Library.
Right: Cabinet of Curiosities created by Nancy Sakaduski