Photos & Papers

Charles Marius Barbeau worked for the National Museum of Canada (now the Canadian Museum of Civilization) from 1911 to 1949. After his retirement and until his death in 1969, he remained closely associated with the Museum.

Throughout his career, he was interested in both Aboriginal and French Canadian cultures. A true pioneer for his research on French Canada, Marius Barbeau collected thousands of pages of notes on a great variety of subjects, including the popular arts, traditional trades, architecture, language, recipes, folk tales, legends and songs, of which more than 3,800 were recorded on wax cylinders. To discover this collection, click on "Papers" on the menu to your left.

Over the years, Marius Barbeau also amassed an impressive collection of some 13,000 photographs documenting his various fields of interest and, more importantly, French Canada during the first half of the 20^th century. He was also a prolific author who published more than 1,000 titles. To discover his collection of photographs, click on "Photographs" on the menu to your left.

These are the unique collections we present here. By clicking on "View all items in the collection" at the bottom of each page, you will be able to see all the items for that particular subject.