North Island have built the country's most important collections for taxonomic and biodiversity research in the northern region of the country. Other important aspects of the collection comprise material from the southwest Pacific, including the most comprehensive record of the Kermadec Islands' marine species. Human History Applied Arts Established in 1966, the Museum's Applied Arts and Design collection includes ceramics, jewellery, furniture, glass, metalwork, costumes, textiles, costume accessories, musical instruments, horological objects and objets d'art from around the world. The collection numbers nearly 7,000 objects and represents key makers, manufacturers, designs, designers and technical developments and styles primarily of Auckland, but also of the Auckland region of New Zealand, and Western and Eastern cultures. The Applied Arts and Design department receives acquisition funds from the Charles Edgar Disney Art Trust, and has a number of loan collections including the Mackelvie Trust Collection. A collection of 7,000 objects from across Asia is displayed on rotation. Mackelvie Collection The Museum has on loan all of the applied arts objects donated to the city of Auckland by James Tannock Mackelvie, a Glaswegian Scot who lived and worked in Auckland from 1865 to 1871. He made a fortune in land speculation and gold-mining investments before returning to London, and was perhaps Auckland's single biggest arts benefactor. Mackelvie was a prodigious collector and from the beginning intended his acquisitions to one day form a teaching collection in New Zealand. Castle Collection of musical instruments A collection of more than 480 musical instruments was acquired in 1996 from Zillah and Ronald Castle. The Castle Collection contains "rare violins, an 18th century harpsichord and an eclectic collection of instruments associated with New Zealand's pioneer days". The items in the collection "range over every imaginable un-powered device capable of producing music", and includes "workable examples of every member of the violin family, as well as didgeridoos, a zuffolo, harpsichords, a crwth, harps, tablas, a sáhn, horns, trumpets, clarinets, [and] a hurdy-gurdy". Archaeology The main focus of the Archaeology collection is Māori material with a range of stylistic and material variation over time and space. Auckland Museum is the only collecting institution to have a curator Archaeology permanently on staff and, significantly, the only institution to curate archaeological assemblages containing not only formal artefacts but also faunal bone and shell samples, stone flakes, and botanical material from excavated sites in the Greater Auckland, Northland and Coromandel Peninsula regions. The