The history of the Museum

In a prosperous Europe converted to botanical gardens, an edict promulgated by King Louis XIII and registered in Parliament on 6 July 1626, authorised the creation of a Medicinal Plant Garden in a suburb of Paris, at the request of Guy de La Brosse. Jean Héroard, the King's first physician, was entrusted with its management. On 15 May 1635, Louis XIII issued an edict establishing the Royal Garden of Medicinal Plants between the Bièvre River and the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Victor (now Rue Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire), under his protection and not under the authority of the Faculty of Medicine. This was followed by five years of work and sowing before it was opened to the public in 1640 and became an immediate success. And for good reason! Its triptych of courses - botany, chemistry and anatomy - was free, accessible to all and, moreover, taught in French (and not in Latin). The Faculty, dominated by the clergy, opposed - without success - the research carried out by the Garden, considered heretical by the Church, such as the study of blood circulation.

The French Revolution's ideal of scientific popularisation prompted the Constituent Assembly to give the establishment its own legal existence: in 1793, a decree gave birth to the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle. From then on, the new institution was headed by a director and already had concerns that are still relevant today: research, public education and collection management. Teaching was divided into twelve professorial chairs.

During the first half of the 19th century, the Museum experienced a period of great prosperity and benefited from important political protection, such as that of the ministers Chaptal and Thiers. With the appointment of the chemist Chevreul as its director in 1836, it turned towards experimental sciences. It was on a par with its rival, the University. This period came to an end with the promulgation of a decree in 1891 that signalled the return of natural history, which remained in force until the eve of the Second World War. In 1907, the Museum took a new step towards autonomy. The Finance Act gave it its own budget.

The 19th and 20th centuries, the high point of scientific exploration, saw the collections grow. In parallel with these new fields of activity, the Museum began to expand outside the capital. In 1849, it was entrusted with the management of the Sansan Paleosite, in the Gers (opened to the public in 2018). To promote its research activities related to the sea, in 1928 it set up its maritime laboratory in Dinard (Ille-et-Vilaine). As his botanical activities were booming, he became the owner of the Chèvreloup estate (Yvelines) in 1934. He also inherited the property of the entomologist Jean Henri Fabre in Sérignan-du-Comtat, near Orange, in 1822. Today, the Museum has 12 sites in mainland France, including 3 in Paris.

After the war, it became involved in raising awareness of the ravages inflicted on natural environments by the expansion of the human race, pollution and the over-exploitation of the Earth's resources. In 1948, the Museum was involved in the creation of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Later, it set up a nature conservation service (1962), the Wildlife and Plant Secretariat (1979) and a permanent environmental delegation (1992). The provinces were not forgotten, with the acquisition in the 1950s and 1960s of the abri Pataud (Pataud shelter) in the Dordogne, le Parc animalier de la Haute-Touche (the Haute-Touche animal park in the Indre), the Jardin botanique de Val Rahmeh (Val Rahmeh botanical garden) in Menton and the marine biology station in Concarneau. Lastly, organisations such as the Nature Conservation Service have set up shop within its walls.