Dr. Scott, Dr. Rachel Mauldin, Dr. Janice Kamrin

2007 – 2010, 3 years

Project description:

In 2007, the Egyptian Museum Registrar Training, a collections management and documentation project commenced, and concluded in 2010. It coincided with projects focused on the preservation of the registration record books (ledgers) and the creation of a database for the Egyptian Museumʼs collections, allowing optimized safekeeping of the historical information critical to the museum’s objects. This undertaking - establishing a registrar office and training its staff - was the first of its kind in Egypt. The Egyptian Museum suffered from a variety of issues that this project aimed to resolve, such as:

• The museum had four official and overlapping numbering systems.
• The museum’s records had traditionally been handwritten, so finding and confirming cross-references was often difficult.
• The museum was divided into sections, with each section responsible for maintaining its own location records; the accuracy of these records varied from one section to another.

An attempt to remedy these issues was made by creating a database in the 90’s, but this database contained a multitude of mistakes (25-35% of all the information was incorrect) and there was no ability to edit or correct these mistakes, as well as no way to add new information.

In 2005, Dr. Janice Kamrin was working with Dr. Zahi Hawass and was struggling immensely to access quality information, thus the decision was made to create a new database for the Egyptian Museum. There were also concerns regarding the safety and accessibility of the museum’s handwritten ledgers, of which there was only one copy, so it was decided they would be digitized. These ledgers recorded three of the Egyptian Museum’s four overlapping series of official numbering systems:

• Journal dʼentrée (JE): The museumʼs principal numbering system since the late 19th century (prior to the opening of the current building at Tahrir), this consists of sequential numbers from 1 to just under 100,000, with many entries registering multiple objects. These are recorded in a series of 25 handwritten volumes.
• Catalogue général (CG): Begun in 1901, and continuing today, these numbers are assigned to objects by category or assemblage. They are recorded in a series of 114 published volumes and 12 manuscripts.
• Temporary Register (TR): In use between 1914 and 2007, this system assigned “temporary numbers” primarily to objects that might not stay in the museum. Many of the objects registered here later got JE or CG numbers.

Prior to the training program, an initial AEF grant was awarded in 2005 and enabled the digitization and conservation of all JEs and TRs (then a total of 37 volumes); the original books were dgitized and archived, and prints were made and bound into replacement volumes. A second AEF grant was awarded in 2007; this funded the digitization and conservation of the remaining ledgers. All digitized content was linked to corresponding records in the database.

Dr. Scott developed a training program in which a small group of museum staff would be trained as registrars -- the first such department in Egypt, following a number of meetings and discussions with Ms. Mauldin (an experienced museum registrar) and Dr. Kamrin. In the planning phase, a first draft of a full collections management protocol for proposed registrars’ office, using the new EMC database as the principal tool to be used alongside a full manual system, was put together. The project was based in the small office on the ground floor of the museum already in use by the EMRSP team. Planning for the Mellon funded complementary Egyptian Museum Database Project was also carried out during the EMRT Planning Phase. Quarterly two-week-long seminars on specific topics presented by Ms. Mauldin, with full-time, hands-on training, were initiated and continued during the remainder of the year under the supervision of Dr. Kamrin and her staff.

Participants in the training program were trained on documentation, accessioning, gallery inventory, object movement, in-house exhibitions, traveling loans, outside requests, condition reporting, memos, object handling, and more.

The final training phase took place starting the fall in 2009 until April 2010, wherein trainees practiced all learned procedures and took quizzes. Department heads were also quizzed on administrative issues. This was followed by a 6-day final assessment. Ultimately, eight individuals were chosen to graduate from the program. By the end of this training program, the Egyptian Museum had officially gained a new department staffed by well-trained employees, with the capacity to manage the museum’s collections and monitor new acquisitions.

Funding note:

The Egyptian Museum Registrar Training project was made possible with the funding provided by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Grant No. 263-A-00-04-00018-00 and administered by the Egyptian Antiquities Project (EAP) of the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE).

Statement of responsibility:

Between the years 2007 and 2010, a collections management and documentation project took place in the Egyptian Museum. It was overseen by Dr. Scott, Dr. Janice Kamrin, and Dr. Rachel Mauldin. This project was made possible with the support of the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities (formerly the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities).

See The Egyptian Museum on Google Maps here

Additional resources

·       https://arce.org/project/egyptian-museum-registrars-training/

·       https://egyptianmuseumcairo.eg/