There is an interesting article in Art Bulletin (September 1997) on this
subject.  It discusses the emergence of the concept of the museum as
we know it today (a collection of objects presented to the public) from
the term's origins as simply a reference to the Alexandrian Museum
(which, as was said before, more of a private, scholarly institution than
our contemporary conception of a museum as something that serves
the public).  The article also talks about the museum as an architectural
program in 18th C. French academic architure.

The title is:
"The Musaeum of Alexandria and the Formation of the Museum in
Eighteenth-Century France," Paula Young Lee.

Rob Lamb