THOMSEN, CHRISTIAN JüRGENSEN

(b. Copenhagen, Denmark, 29 December 1788; d. Copenhagen, 21 May 1865)

archaeology.

Thomsen was the son of Christian Thomsen, a merchant and counselor-at-law (Justitsieråd), and Hedevig Margaretha Jürgensen. He was privately educated, since his father intended him to take over the family shipping business, and did not attend a university. Thomsen followed his father’s wishes and entered a business career, but closed the family firm after the death of his mother in 1840. By that time he was firmly established in a second career as a museum director.

Thomsen had from his youth been interested in collecting art, antiquities, and, especially, coins, and his family’s wealth allowed him to indulge these tastes. He was soon known for his numismatic knowledge and for his beautiful and well-organized collection of coins; in 1816, in spite of his youth and his lack of an academic degree, he was made secretary of the Danish Commission for the Preservation of Antiquities and put in charge of their museum. He arranged the collections, which he found in a sorry state, chronologically, and in 1820 divided prehistoric artifacts into representatives of the Stone, Iron, and Bronze Ages, an archaeological sequence that he mentioned in letters as early as 1818. This new chronology was soon widely accepted in English-speaking countries, in which Thomsen’s claim to priority was also recognized. It was, however, disputed in Germany, as was Thomsen’s assertion of priority, a situation that may have arisen because Thomsen only rarely published articles in scientific journals and, indeed, did not publish his chronology until 1836.

Thomsen was an organizer and modernizer. He was one of the first to use museums as a tool for popular education, and to this end took the almost unprecedented step of opening his collections to the public free of charge. He also lectured widely to lay audiences, hoping thereby both to encourage a general knowledge of antiquities and to create a climate favorable for the working archaeologist. He was successful in these aims, and encouraged a number of enthusiastic amateurs, who made a number of significant archaeological finds. In 1838 he was made inspector of a complex of museums of art, archaeology, and history in Copenhagen, and in 1849 succeeded to their directorship.

In 1841 Thomsen also established the first ethnographical museum, in which he designed exhibits focused upon the tools of ordinary life, showing how peoples really lived, rather than upon rarities. In this museum he also introduced the notion of organizing exhibits according to a “principle of progressive culture,” to demonstrate cultural development. His ideas of archaeology, ethnography, and museum direction were all well in advance of his time. That they were widely accepted and emulated is a tribute to Thomsen’s persuasive power and to his skill in winning professional agreement to his methods and public support for his interests.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I.Original Works. Since Thomsen published few works in scientific publications, his ideas are known chiefly through letters, newspaper articles, and museum pamphlets and catalogues of exhibitions. His prehistoric chronology is in Ledetraad til Nordisk Oldkyndighed (Copenhagen, 1836), translated into German as Leitfaden zur nordischen Alterthumskunde. . . . (Copenhagen, 1837).

II. Secondary Literature. On Thomsen and his work, see V. Hermansen, C. J. Thomsen and the Founding of the Ethnographical Museum (Copenhagen, 1941); and “Christian J. Thomsen”, in Dansk Biografisk Lexicon, XXIII (Copenhagen, 1942), 550-556; B. Hildebrant, “C. J. Thomsen och hans lärda förbindelser i Sverige 1816-1837”, in Kungliga Vitterhets, Historie och Antikvitets Akademiens Handlingar, 1937-1938 (1938); and H. Seger, “Die Anfönge des Dreiperioden Systems”, in Schumacher-;Festshrift zum 70. Geburtsag Karl Schumacher, 14. oktober 1930 (Mainz. 1930).

Nils Spjeldnaes