It consisted of a library of scientific works, a museum with old Irish manuscripts and stones with ogham inscriptions, and lecture and reading rooms.
It operated from premises on the South Mall opposite the current Imperial hotel and was a British government supported educational centre for 70 years.
It also established the Crawford College of Art and Design, now part of the Cork Institute of Technology (CIT).
The RCI acquired these from the Society of Fine Arts in Cork, who were given them by the Prince Regent later George IV.
He had received them from Pope Pius VII who had commissioned Antonio Canova to make a set of plasters from statues in the Vatican.