Towards the end of the year 1828, the Viscount of Martignac, Interior minister of King Charles X and the real head of the government at that time (as well as being a childhood friend of Bory in Bordeaux), charged six academicians of the Institute de France (Georges Cuvier, Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, Charles-Benoît Hase, Desiré-Raoul Rochette, Jean-Nicolas Hyot and Jean-Antoine Letronne) with appointing the chief-officers and members of each section of a scientific committee to be attached to the Morea expedition, just as had been done previously with the Commission of Sciences and Arts during Napoleon's campaign in Egypt. Bory was thus appointed director of the commission. The minister and the academicians also determined the routes and objectives. Bory wrote, "Messrs. De Martignac and Siméon had asked me expressly not to restrict my observations to Flies and Herbs, but to extend them to places and to men later..." .