The study of antiquities was a key element for the institutionalization of the Colombian Academy of History. This article analyzes the content of the Academy’s journal, Boletín de Historia y Antigüedades between 1902 and 1943, and several texts written by precursors and prominent members of the Academy. Based on these sources, the article shed light on how was articulated the institutional and epistemological validation of arqueological objects. Aesthetics concerns, concludes the article, played an important role in the way the local intelligentsia interpreted the indigenous material culture before the academic institutionalization of Anthropology in Colombia.