London - British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present.

The centre of the museum was redeveloped in 2001 to become the Great Court, surrounding the original Reading Room

The British Museum was established in 1753, largely based on the collections of the physician and scientist Sir Hans Sloane. The museum first opened to the public on 15 January 1759 in Montagu House in Bloomsbury, on the site of the current museum building. Its expansion over the following two and a half centuries was largely a result of an expanding British colonial footprint and has resulted in the creation of several branch institutions, the first being the British Museum (Natural History) in South Kensington in 1887. Some objects in the collection, most notably the Elgin Marbles from the Parthenon, are the objects of intense controversy and of calls for restitution to their countries of origin.

The re-opened Duveen Gallery, (1980)

Until 1997, when the British Library (previously centred on the Round Reading Room) moved to a new site, the British Museum was unique in that it housed both a national museum of antiquities and a national library in the same building. The museum is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and as with all other national museums in the United Kingdom it charges no admission fee. Since 2002 the director of the museum has been Neil MacGregor.

 

African Garden - The British Museum Facade - created by BBC TV programme Ground Force

 

The entrance to the museum

Departments

Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan

The British Museum houses the world's largest and most comprehensive collection of Egyptian antiquities outside the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. A collection of immense importance for its range and quality, it includes objects of all periods from virtually every site of importance in Egypt and the Sudan. Together they illustrate every aspect of the cultures of the Nile Valley (including Nubia), from the Predynastic Neolithic period (c. 10,000 BC) through to the Coptic (Christian) times (12th century AD), a time-span over 11,000 years.

 

The King's Library

Egyptian antiquities have formed part of the British Museum collection ever since its foundation in 1753 after receiving 160 Egyptian objects from Sir Hans Sloane. After the defeat of the French forces under Napoleon at the Battle of the Nile in 1801, the Egyptian antiquities collected were confiscated by the British army and presented to the British Museum in 1803. These works, which included the famed Rosetta Stone, were the first important group of large sculptures to be acquired by the Museum. Thereafter, the UK appointed Henry Salt as consul in Egypt who amassed a huge collection of antiquities. Most of the antiquities Salt collected were purchased by the British Museum and the Musée du Louvre. By 1866 the collection consisted of some 10,000 objects. Antiquities from excavations started to come to the Museum in the later 19th century as a result of the work of the Egypt Exploration Fund under the efforts of E.A. Wallis Budge. The collection stood at 57,000 objects by 1924. Active support by the Museum for excavations in Egypt continued to result in useful acquisitions throughout the 20th century until changes in antiquities laws in Egypt led to the suspension of policies allowing finds to be exported. The size of the Egyptian collections now stands at over 110,000 objects.

The British Museum, Great Court

In autumn 2001 the eight million objects forming the Museum's permanent collection were further expanded by the addition of six million objects from the Wendorf Collection of Egyptian and Sudanese Prehistory. These were donated by Professor Fred Wendorf of Southern Methodist University in Texas, and comprise the entire collection of artefacts and environmental remains from his excavations between 1963 and 1997. They are in the care of the Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan.

The British Museum, Room 4 - Colossal red granite statue of Amenhotep III (1350 BC)

The seven permanent Egyptian galleries at the British Museum, which include its largest exhibition space (Room 4, for monumental sculpture), can display only 4% of its Egyptian holdings. The second-floor galleries have a selection of the Museum's collection of 140 mummies and coffins, the largest outside Cairo.

Room 4 - Egyptian Sculpture

A high proportion of the collection comes from tombs or contexts associated with the cult of the dead, and it is these pieces, in particular the mummies, that remain among the most eagerly sought after exhibits by visitors to the Museum.

Perennial favourites; a group of coffins for mummies

Key highlights of the collections include:

• The Rosetta Stone (196 BC)
• The Battlefield Palette, (circa ~3500 to 3000 BC).
• Limestone statue of a husband and wife (1300 BC)
• Colossal bust of Ramesses II, the "Younger Memnon" (1250 BC)
• Colossal red granite statue of Amenhotep III (1350 BC)
• Colossal head from a statue of Amenhotep III (1350 BC)

Room 4 - Egyptian Sculpture

• Colossal limestone bust of Amenhotep III (1350 BC)
• Saite Sarcophagus of Satsobek
• Mummy of 'Ginger' which dates to about 3300 BC
• List of the kings of Egypt from the Temple of Ramesses II (1250 BC)
• Limestone false door of Ptahshepses (2380 BC)
• Granite statue of Senwosret III (1850 BC)
• Mummy of Cleopatra from Thebes (100 AD)
• Amarna tablets (Collection of 95 out of 382 tablets found, second greatest in the world after the Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin (203 tablets) (1350 BC)[49]
• Obelisk of Pharaoh Nectanebo II (360–343 BC)
• Gayer-Anderson cat

The British Museum, Room 83 - Roman Sculpture

Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities

The Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities of the British Museum has one of the world's largest and most comprehensive collections of antiquities from the Classical world, with over 100,000 objects. These mostly range in date from the beginning of the Greek Bronze Age (about 3200BC) to the reign of the Roman Emperor Constantine I in the 4th century AD, with some pagan survivals.

The British Museum, Room 21 - Mausoleum of Halikarnassos

The Cycladic, Minoan and Mycenaean cultures are represented, and the Greek collection includes important sculpture from the Parthenon in Athens, as well as elements of two of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos and the Temple of Artemis at Ephesos.

The British Museum, Room 10 - Human Headed Winged Bulls from Khorsabad, companion pieces in the Musée du Louvre

The Department also houses one of the widest-ranging collections of Italic and Etruscan antiquities and extensive groups of material from Cyprus. The collections of ancient jewellery and bronzes, Greek vases and Roman glass and silver are particularly important.

Cyrus Cylinder; is regarded by many as the world’s first documented charter of human rights

Athenian Akropolis

The Parthenon Gallery (Elgin Marbles)

Erechtheion

One of six remaining Caryatids

Surviving Column

Athena Nike

Surviving Frieze Slabs

Bassae Sculptures

Twenty three surviving blocks of the frieze from the interior of the temple are exhibited on an upper level.

Room 4 - Egyptian Sculpture

The British Museum, Room 21 - Mausoleum of HalikarnassosMausoleum of Halikarnassos

One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

Two colossal free-standing figures identified as Maussollos and his wife Artemisia.

Part of an impressive horse from the chariot group adorning the summit of the Mausoleum

The Amazonomachy frieze - A long section of relief frieze showing the battle between Greeks and Amazons

Temple of Artemis at Ephesos

One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

Room 10 - Khorsabad Palace Reliefs

Asia Minor

Nereid Monument

Partial reconstruction of the Monument, a large and elaborate Lykian tomb from the site of Xanthos in south-west Turkey

Payava Tomb from Xanthos in south west Turkey

Wider Museum Collection

Material from the Palace of Knossos

Portland Vase

The Warren Cup

Discus-thrower (Discobolos)

Towneley Sculptures

The British Museum, Room 6 - Assyrian Sculpture

Department of the Middle East

Formerly the Department of the Ancient Near East, the Department recently[when?] became the Department of the Middle East when the collections from the Islamic world were moved from the Department of Asia into this department.

Room 9 - Nineveh Palace Reliefs

With approximately 330,000 objectsin the collection, the British Museum has the greatest collection of Mesopotamian antiquities outside Iraq. The holdings of Assyrian, Babylonian and Sumerian antiquities are among the most comprehensive in the world.

The British Museum, Room 6 - Pair of Human Headed Winged Lions and Reliefs from Nimrud with The Gates of Balawat

The collections represent the civilisations of the ancient Near East and its adjacent areas. These include Mesopotamia, Persia, the Arabian Peninsula, Anatolia, the Caucasus, parts of Central Asia, Syria, Palestine and Phoenician settlements in the western Mediterranean from the prehistoric period until the beginning of Islam in the 7th century.

Room 10 - Nineveh, The Royal Lion Hunt

The collection includes six iconic winged human-headed statues from Nimrud and Khorsabad. Stone bas-reliefs, including the famous Royal Lion Hunt relief's (Room 10), that were found in the palaces of the Assyrian kings at Nimrud and Nineveh. The Royal Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh and Sumerian treasures found in Royal Cemetery's at Ur of the Chaldees.

Room 89 - Nimrud & Nineveh Palace Reliefs

The earliest Mesopotamian objects to enter collections purchased by the British Museum in 1772 from Sir William Hamilton. The Museum also acquired at this early date a number of sculptures from Persepolis. The next significant addition (in 1825) was from the collection of Claudius James Rich. The collection was dramatically enlarged by the excavations of A. H. Layard at the Assyrian sites of Nimrud and Nineveh between 1845–1851.

The British Museum, Room 55 - Cuneiform Collection, including the Epic of Gilgamesh

At Nimrud, Layard discovered the North-West Palace of Ashurnasirpal II, as well as three other palaces and various temples. He also opened in the Palace of Sennacherib at Nineveh with 'no less than seventy-one halls'. As a result a large numbers of Lamassu's, bas-reliefs, stelae, including the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III were brought to the British Museum.

Room 18 - Parthenon Freize

Layard's work was continued by his assistant, Hormuzd Rassam and in 1852–1854 he went on to discover the North Palace of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh with many magnificent reliefs, including the famous Royal Lion Hunt scenes. He also discovered the Royal Library of Ashurbanipal, a large collection of cuneiform tablets of enormous importance.

Room 18 - Ancient Greece

W. K. Loftus excavated in Nimrud between 1850–1855 and found a remarkable hoard of ivories in the Burnt Palace. Between 1878–1882 Rassam greatly improved the Museum's holdings with exquisite objects including the Cyrus Cylinder from Babylon, the bronze gates from Balawat, and a fine collection of Urartian bronzes. Rassam collected thousands of cuneiform tablets, today with the acquisition of further tablets in the 20th century, the collection now numbers around 130,000 pieces.

Room 84 - Towneley Sculptures

In the 20th century excavations were carried out at Carchemish, Turkey, between 1911–1914 and in 1920 by D. G. Hogarth and Leonard Woolley, the latter assisted by T. E. Lawrence. The Mesopotamian collections were greatly augmented by excavations in southern Iraq after the First World War. From Tell al-Ubaid in 1919 and 1923–1924, directed by H. R. Hall came the bronze furnishings of a Sumerian temple, including life-sized lions and a panel featuring the lion-headed eagle Indugud. Woolley went onto to excavate Ur between 1922–1934, discovering the 'Royal Cemeteries' of the 3rd millennium BC. Some of the masterpieces include the 'Standard of Ur', the 'Ram in a Thicket', the 'Royal Game of Ur', and two bull-headed lyres.

Although the collections centre on Mesopotamia most of the surrounding areas are well-represented. The Achaemenid collection was enhanced with the addition of the Oxus Treasure in 1897, by acquisition from the German scholar Ernst Herzfeld, and then by the work of Sir Aurel Stein. From Palmyra there is a large collection of nearly forty funerary busts, acquired in the 19th century.

Room 19 - Athens, Erechtheion Sculptures from the Acropolis

 A group of stone reliefs from the excavations of Max von Oppenheim at Tell Halaf, purchased in 1920. More excavated material from the excavations of Max Mallowan at Chagar Bazar and Tell Brak in 1935–1938, and from Woolley at Alalakh in the years just before and after the Second World War. The collection of Palestinian material was strengthened with the acquisition in 1980 of around 17,000 objects found at Lachish by the Wellcome-Marston expedition of 1932–1938.

Amravati Gallery

A representative selection, including the most important pieces, are on display in 13 galleries and total some 4500 objects. The remainder form the study collection which ranges in size from beads to large sculptures. They include approximately 130,000 cuneiform tablets from Mesopotamia.

Painting by Chinese artist Gu Kaizhi, c. 380 AD.

The museum's collection of Islamic art, including archaeological material, numbers about 40,000 objects, one of the largest of its kind in the world. As such, it contains a broad range of Islamic pottery, paintings, tiles, metalwork, glass, seals, and inscriptions.

Key highlights of the collections include: Nimrud:

Alabaster bas-reliefs from:

The North-West Palace of Ashurnasirpal II

Central- Palace of Tiglath-Pileser III

South-West Palace of Esarhaddon

Palace of Adad-Nirari III

South-East Palace ('Burnt Palace')

The Nabu Temple (Ezida)

The Sharrat-Niphi Temple

Temple of Ninurta

Room 5 - Exhibitions Panorama

Sculptures:

Pair of Human Headed 'Lamassu' Lions (883-859 BC)

Human Headed 'Lamassu' Bull (883-859 BC), sister piece in The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Human Headed 'Lamassu' Lion (883-859 BC), sister piece in The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Colossal Statue of a Lion (883-859 BC)

Rare Head of Human Headed 'Lamassu', recovered from the South-West Palace of Esarhaddon

The Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III (858-824 BC)

 

 

Room 5 - The Persepolis Casts

Nineveh:

Alabaster bas-reliefs from:

North-Palace of Ashurbanipal

Royal Lion Hunt Scenes

The 'Dying Lion', long been acclaimed as a masterpiece

The 'Garden Party' Relief

South-West Palace of Sennacherib

 Royal Library of Ashurbanipal:

A large collection of cuneiform tablets of enormous importance approximately 22,000 inscribed clay tablets

The Flood Tablet, relating part of the famous Epic of Gilgamesh

Khorsabad:

Alabaster bas-reliefs from the Palace of Sargon II

Pair of Human Headed Winged 'Lamassu' Bulls

 Wider Collection:

Cyrus Cylinder, from Babylon

The Balawat Gates of Shalmaneser III

A fine collection of Urartian bronzes, which now form the core of the Anatolian collection

The Oxus Treasure

The Standard of Ur

The 'Ram in a Thicket'

The Royal Game of Ur

Queen's Lyre

 

Painting by Chinese artist Gu Kaizhi, c. 380 AD.

Department of Prints and Drawings 

The British Museum, Room 90 - Michelangelo's Epifania - his only surviving large scale cartoon.The Department of Prints and Drawings holds the national collection of Western Prints and Drawings. It ranks as one of the largest and best print room collections in existence alongside the Albertina in Vienna, the Paris collections and the Hermitage. The holdings are easily accessible to the general public in the Study Room, unlike many such collections. The Department also has its own exhibition gallery in Room 90, where the displays and exhibitions change several times a year.

Portrait of Ibrâhîm 'Âdil Shâh II (1580–1626), Mughal Empire of India, 1615 AD

Since its foundation in 1808 the Prints and Drawings collection has grown to international renown as one of the richest and most representative collections in the world. There are approximately 50,000 drawings and over two million prints.

Room 5 - Exhibitions Relics

The collection of drawings covers the period from the 14th century to the present, and includes many works of the highest quality by the leading artists of the European schools. The collection of prints covers the tradition of fine printmaking from its beginnings in the 15th century up to the present, with near complete holdings of most of the great names before the 19th century.

A Hamsa sacred swan vessel made of crystal, from Gandhara, 1st century AD.

There are magnificent groups of drawings by Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo, (including his only surviving full-scale cartoon), Dürer (a collection of 138 drawings is one of the finest in existence), Peter Paul Rubens, Rembrandt, Claude and Watteau, and largely complete collections of the works of all the great printmakers including Dürer (99 engravings, 6 etchings and most of his 346 woodcuts), Rembrandt and Goya. More than 30,000 British drawings and watercolours include important examples of work by Hogarth, Sandby, Turner, Girtin, Constable, Cotman, Cox, Gillray, Rowlandson and Cruikshank, as well as all the great Victorians. There are about a million British prints including more than 20,000 satires and outstanding collections of works by William Blake and Thomas Bewick.

Otobo masquerade

Department of Asia 

The scope of the Department of Asia is extremely broad, its collections of over 75,000 objects covers the material culture of the whole Asian continent (from East, South, Central and South-East Asia) and from the Neolithic up to the present day.

The British Museum, Room 24 - The Wellcome Trust Gallery with Hoa Hakananai'a in the centre

Key highlights of the collections include:

The most comprehensive collection of sculpture from the Indian subcontinent in the world, including the celebrated Buddhist limestone reliefs from Amaravati.

An outstanding collection of Chinese antiquities, paintings, and porcelain, lacquer, bronze, jade, and other applied arts

A fine collection of Buddhist paintings from Dunhuang and the Admonitions Scroll by Chinese artist Gu Kaizhi (344–406 AD)

The most comprehensive collection of Japanese pre-20th century art in the Western world.

 

The Royal Gold Cup, French, c. 1390 in gold, jewels and enamel. Saint Agnes appears to her friends in a vision

Department of Africa

The British Museum houses one of the world's greatest and most comprehensive collections of Ethnographic material from Africa, Oceania and the Americas, representing the cultures of indigenous peoples throughout the world. Over 350,000 objects spanning two million years tells the story of the history of man, from three major continents and many rich and diverse cultures.

 

Main Staircase, Discobolus of Myron (the Discus-Thrower)

The Sainsbury African Galleries display 600 objects from the greatest permanent collection of African arts and culture in the world. The three permanent galleries provide a substantial exhibition space for the Museum's African collection comprising over 200,000 objects. A curatorial scope that encompasses both archaeological and contemporary material, including both unique masterpieces of artistry and objects of everyday life.

 

A few of the Elgin Marbles (also known as the Parthenon Marbles) from the East Pediment of the Parthenon

Department of Coins and Medals

The British Museum is home to one of the world's finest numismatic collections, comprising about a million objects. The collection spans the entire history of coinage from its origins in the 7th century BC to the present day. There are approximately 9,000 coins, medals and banknotes on display around the British Museum. More than half of these can be found in the HSBC Money Gallery (Gallery 68), while the remainder form part of the permanent displays throughout the Museum. Items from the full collection can be seen by the general public in the Study Room by appointment.

Room 5 - The Cyrus Cylinder

Department of Prehistory and Europe

The Department of Prehistory and Europe is responsible for collections that cover a vast expanse of time and geography. It includes the some of the earliest objects made by humans 2 million years ago; the art and archaeology of Europe from the earliest times to the present day, including the history of Britain under Roman occupation. It also includes the national collection of clocks and watches.

Key highlights of the collections include:

The Sutton Hoo treasure

The Lewis chessmen

The Ringlemere Cup

Vindolanda Tablets

Lycurgus Cup

Royal Gold Cup

Holy Thorn Reliquary

Franks Casket

The many hoards of treasure include the Mildenhall Treasure, Water Newton Treasure, Hoxne Hoard, and Vale of York Hoard.

Department of Conservation and Scientific Research

This department was founded in 1920. Conservation has six specialist areas: ceramics & glass; metals; organic material (including textiles); stone, wall paintings and mosaics; Eastern pictorial art and Western pictorial art. The science department has and continues to develop techniques to date artefacts, analyse and identify the materials used in their manufacture, to identify the place an artefact originated and the techniques used in their creation. The department also publishes its findings and discoveries.

Room 4 - Egyptian Sculpture, view towards the Assyrian Transept