Collecting objects from classical antiquity dates back in Munich to the princely collections of the Wittelsbach family.
King Ludwig I, to whom to this day the State Collections of Antiquities and the Glyptothek owe their core inventory, pursued - with the museums that he built - the goal of "transplanting these beauties to his northern homeland so that they would be freely accessible free of charge to everyone as a source of the finest art education". In the museums, which today are owned by the Federal State of Bavaria, objects were collected for the purpose of expanding and supplementing the collection.
