Parallel Heritages, Humanities in Action: The Columbia and Sorbonne Collections of Antiquities

Résumé En

In early 2019, an exciting joint research project was launched by the Department of Art History and Archaeology at Columbia University in New York and the Department of Histoire de l’art et Archéologie of the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, focusing on the origin, development, and present state of university collections of Classical antiquities at both institutions. This goal of this project, named Parallel Heritages, Humanities in Action: The Sorbonne and Columbia Collections of Antiquities is to achieve a complete inventory of these collections, a detailed tracing of their genesis and history, and an exploitation of their value for the benefit of the respective university and city. Beyond their inherent research and teaching values, these collections are part of both universities’ tangible heritage, whose long-term conservation and transmission are an institutional concern, and immaterial heritage, whose objects encapsulate both an epistemological approach and historical record of teaching classical archaeology.