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→Early Renaissance
==Early Renaissance==
After the Classical period, the idea of a museum seems to not be utilized very much, although studying ancient scholarship continued in the Near East for many centuries long after the fall of Rome. Therefore, the past was still seen as a source of knowledge, although we don't know much about formal museums.
The two oldest continuous museums are found in Rome, the Capitoline and Vatican Museums. The former was essentially a collection of Roman sculptures gifted by Pope Sixtus IV. Discovery of sculptures also inspired the Vatican museum, as Pope Julius II was inspired by the discovery to preserve the pieces in the Vatican's collections.<ref> For more on how Classical sculptors and their discovery spawned an interest in the past, including developing early museums in Rome, particularly Roman and Greek history, see: Haskell, Francis, and Nicholas Penny, eds. 1982. Taste and the Antique: The Lure of Classical Sculpture 1500 - 1900. 2. print., (with corrections). New Haven London: Yale Univ. Press.</ref> This interest spawns an interest in the Classics in general and a rebirth of ideas and focus on the pre-Christian past. Soon, objects began to be collected not just by officials or religious figures but by wealthy individuals. By the 16th century, a new era began, where large collections of artifacts were now collected for their sake, as interest in the past continued. In Europe, the so-called cabinets of curiosities began to be made, which were sometimes large private collections of ancient artifacts, fossils, or other remains that sparked interest in the past.<ref> For more on the so-called cabinets of curiosities popular in Rennaisance and early modern Europe, see: Mauriès, Patrick. 2011. Cabinets of Curiosities. New York: Thames & Hudson.
</ref> The interest in the past continued as the Renaissance gave way to the Age of Enlightenment, which now began scientific interests as well as simple curiosity to collect.
