Mariette's miscellaneous collection

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This photo of the main hall of the Boulaq Museum, the first museum of Egyptian antiquities in Cairo, published in the Album de Musée de Boulaq in 1871, shows that objects collected from sites all over the country were exhibited artistically, not with a view to historical sequence. In other words, the museum was designed to arouse an interest in Egypt's Pharaonic heritage, develop a consciousness of a national heritage, and help curb indiscriminate excavations and the wholesale exportion of antiquities abroad.