This does not mean that French Cabinets de Curiosités were entirely devoid of American objects. Their presence was acknowledged, the most important instance being the Codex Telleriano-Remensis,the collection of artifacts given to the Royal Library by Archbishop Le Tellier at the beginning of the eighteenth century. A few Peruvian ceramics were also taken back to France by smugglers from Saint Malo, with the help of French residents in Lima, such as Dr. Leblond. In addition, there was a great desire to acquire larger collections, as was made obvious in documents such as the instructions issued to the Jussieu–La Condamine and Dombey expeditions to peru, which directed the teams to try to collect artifacts from Chancay and Pachacamac. But the whole collection amounted to little more than a few items, and the American past was more likely to be the subject of speculative or literary activity.

As Keen amply demonstrated (1971), from the end of the sixteenth century until 1820, the Americas and the Amerindian civilizations became the focus of a growing interest. The pioneering books of De Belleforest in 1572 and Thevet, a geographer in the court of King Henri II, were quickly translated into many languages. Discussions of the Americas became contentious as time went by, and most well-known eighteenth-century philosophers, such as Buffon, Voltaire, and Prevost, took sides in these controversies. The Americas even provided a source of inspiration for poetry, theater, and opera. This general interest for American civilizations was part of an increasing tendency to dwell on humankind’s past. As Schnapp recently demonstrated, archaeology—or at least scholarly activity in archaeology—was establishing itself as a scientific discipline, and discoveries in southern Italy quickly led to the systematic study of ruins. The kings of spain promoted this research and sent explorers to the Mayan ruins of palenque (Baudez 1987). In Mexico the chance discovery of aztec sculptures in 1792 prompted national investigations by scholars such as Alzate and Leon y Gama. The Bonaparte expedition to Egypt stands out as the most famous example of early French studies in archaeology. The American continent was not entirely neglected, as evidenced by the travels of Humboldt and Bonpland in South and Central America in 1810. The French concept of the American past was anthropological in nature, expressing a natural historical approach rather than an interest in American art, and French research focused mainly on human diversity, not just upon archaeological remains. The end of Spanish rule in Latin America provided opportunities that France and other countries seized immediately.

The breakthrough for French Americanism came in 1834, six years before Stephens and Catherwood’s book, with the appearance of Antiquités Mexicaines. This book included the manuscripts of Galindom Del Rio and Juarros, as well as articles by Humboldt, Warden, Jomard Baraère, and even Chateaubriand, but it failed to attract much attention. The French public had to wait 150 years to be able to read Stephens and Catherwood’s book in translation. This situation symbolizes perfectly the original inadequacy of French Americanism in the nineteenth century—too little and too late.

A Century of Exploration

For the whole of the nineteenth century (or, more precisely, from 1824 to 1914), American archaeology in France remained restricted to a small circle of explorers and scholars, who succeeded in obtaining the backing of official institutions but failed to raise public interest. French explorers and adventurers, though few in number, were able to organize associations and committees to raise funds for their travels. The French Ministry for Public Instruction was the most prominent sponsor, especially after the creation of the Mission Service, but the Natural History Museum and the Navy also played useful roles. For example, in 1836, the ship La Venus, commanded by Dupetit-Thouars, was instructed by Brongniart to collect Peruvian ceramics for the Musée de Sèvres. Societies such as the Geographical Society in Paris created prizes and medals, published reports, and organized conferences, and they succeeded in attracting investigators from other countries, such as the American antiquarian Ephraim Squier and naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, as corresponding members.