A study of the political and social values underpinning interest in Irish archaeology and the establishment of the first public or national museum in Ireland, the Dublin Museum of Science and Art, later re-established as the National Museum of Ireland. It examines the value systems and ideological beliefs inherent in the museum-building process and shows that the complexity of Irish history and politics is mirrored in the range of attitudes to the Irish past. These are revealed in the care and ownership of the material remains of antiquity. The social and political role of museum collections is explored through the history of museum provision in Dublin. Elizabeth Crooke shows how a certain vision of the Irish nation has shaped, and continues to shape, the core of archaeology and the work of museums in contemporary Ireland.