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HISTORY OF THE COLLECTION AT PEKING UNIVERSITY

The collection of Chinese art and artifacts currently housed in this new museum on the campus of Peking University contains more than 10,000 objects and spans a period of 280,000 years, from Paleolithic hominids and stone tool remains to costumes, ceramics and paintings of the present era. The collection, which is used for teaching and research purposes, has been acquired during the past seventy years from diverse sources.

In 1922 China's first Archaeology Research Office was set up at Peking University. The office launched a fieldwork program, and through this program Peking University gradually began to build a collection of archaeological remains. A few years later together with the creation of the Peking University Museum, a special museum training course was created. At this time, in addition to excavated artifacts, the museum's collections expanded to include antiquities from the antiquity market, and ethnographic materials.

In 1952 Peking University moved to its current location in the Haidian District on the outskirts of Beijing. In doing so it moved onto the campus of the former Yanjing University, an American college established in 1920 which closed its doors shortly after 1949. A Prehistory Museum at Yanjing University, with its own collections, had also existed there. After 1952, its collections were transferred to the newly formed Archaeology Division at Peking University.

Since 1952 the archaeologists at Peking University have continually added to their collection through their extensive fieldwork program. In 1983, when the Archaeology Division acquired full department status, they further expanded their fieldwork activities. Archaeologists from Peking University have worked all over China, but they have concentrated their research on sites in the Central Plains and the north. They have excavated in Shaanxi, Shanxi, Henan, Hebei, Liaoning, Xinjiang, Shandong, Hubei and Jiangxi.

With the creation of the Arthur M. Sackler Museum of Art & Archaeology at Peking University, the collections have grown even more through the generous loans and gifts made by archaeological institutions from all over China. These contributions have been made to celebrate the opening of this new museum which is expected to play an important role in the field of Chinese archaeology and museology.