Records of the Department of Palaeontology

Records of the Department of Palaeontology of the Natural History Museum.

DF 100 Department of Palaeontology: Departmental Correspondence

DF 101 Department of Palaeontology: Registers of Departmental Correspondence

DF 102 Department of Palaeontology: Departmental Finance and Accounts

DF 103 Department of Palaeontology: Reports to Trustees and other Official Documents

DF 104 Department of Palaeontology: Reports of Progress, Monthly and Annual

DF 105 Department of Palaeontology: Acquisition, Loan and Exchange Correspondence and Papers

DF 106 Department of Palaeontology: Staff Files and Diaries

DF 107 Department of Palaeontology: Keeper's subject files

DF 108 Department of Palaeontology: departmental visitors books

DF 109 Department of Palaeontology: publications correspondence and artwork

DF 110 Department of Palaeontology: parcel books

DF 116 Department of Palaeontology: correspondence and papers on Piltdown Man

DF 117 Department of Palaeontology: loan registers

DF 120 Department of Palaeontology: early members of staff, correspondence and papers

DF 121 Department of Palaeontology, Fossil Reptilia Section: correspondence and papers

DF 122 Department of Palaeontology, Fossil Mollusca Section: correspondence and papers

DF 123 Department of Palaeontology, Fossil Echinodermata Section: correspondence and papers

DF 124 Department of Palaeontology, Fossil Brachiopoda Section: correspondence and papers

DF 125 Department of Palaeontology, Fossil and Recent Protozoa Section: correspondence and papers

DF 140 Anthropology Sub-Department: correspondence

DF 141 Anthropology Sub-Department: subject files

DF 142 Anthropology Sub-Department: visitors books

DF 160 Department of Palaeontology: Palaeontology Library accessions

DF 161 Department of Palaeontology: Palaeontology Librarian's correspondence

Topics

Art, architecture and design

Museums and galleries

Diaries

The Department of Palaeontology has its origins in the Department of Natural and Artificial Productions which was set up at the foundation of the British Museum in 1756. In 1806 it was renamed the Department of Natural History and Modern Curiosities and was under the keepership of George Shaw (1751-1813) and later Carl Dietrich Eberhard Konig (1774-1851).

In 1837 the Department was divided into three branches, of which Mineralogy and Geology was one, and in 1856 the branch became a Department in its own right, almost immediately being divided into the two departments of Geology and Mineralogy. The first Keeper of Geology was George Robert Waterhouse (1810-1888), an entomologist, who had joined the Museum in 1843 from the Zoological Society. He was succeeded in 1880 by Henry Woodward (1832-1921), who thus had the task of supervising the move from Bloomsbury to South Kensington. By the time Woodward retired in 1901 the Department had a staff of 15.

Through the 1920s and 1930s the collections were divided into 15 units, each presided over by an Assistant Keeper or an Unofficial Worker. Subdivision of the Department into sections developed during this period, and was firmly established when the Museum got back to normal after the Second World War. An Anthropology Section, which spanned the departments of Geology and Zoology was set up in 1954. It was given the status of a Sub-Department in 1959, and was made part of Palaeontology the following year.

In 1956 the title of the Department was changed from Geology to Palaeontology.

By 1956 the Department was responsible for one of the largest and most important collections of palaeontological material in the world, and was an international centre for research in both stratigraphic and taxonomic palaeontology. Research work was supported by a rich departmental library. The exhibition galleries of the Department, particularly those crowded with skeletons of extinct mammals and reptiles, were among the most popular in the Museum. By 1956 staff numbered 63.

List of Keepers of the Department of Palaeontology: