The recent unveiling of Ancient Worlds marked the centenary of the first Egypt gallery to be opened at the Manchester Museum.
The museum’s ancient Egypt and archaeology collections are of international importance and, following a major development project, have been magnificently redisplayed in three new galleries, which also reveal the beauty of the architecture of the Alfred Waterhouse-designed building.
And, given that the Manchester Museum is the UK’s largest university museum, the results of some of the research undertaken into the collections is on display.
The first gallery looks at our relationship with the past, the archaeological techniques used to comprehend it and how our understanding is coloured by the world today.
The space is large and light-filled with waist-high glass cases showing an eclectic selection of artefacts from the museum’s collections. Many are on display for the first time.
The objects range from the significant, such as the 2nd-century Manchester Wordsquare, to the everyday, the broken dinner plates, chipped tea cups and other detritus of early 20th-century life revealed by the Sandhills Cottages Project, which researched a row of cottages demolished in the 1950s and conducted interviews with some of the former occupants.
Hanging from the ceiling are graphics and screens focusing on Manchester’s contribution to archaeology.
These include Thomas Barritt, an 18th-century saddlemaker and collector of antiquities; pioneering archaeologist Sir Flinders Petrie, whose excavations were funded by Manchester businessman Jesse Haworth; Barri Jones, former professor of archaeology at the University of Manchester; and Alan Garner, author of the 1960s children’s cult fantasy novel, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen.
The positioning of the screens makes it feel as though you are part of a conversation.
This gallery also showcases new scientific techniques used for archaeological research, such as the analysis of ancient landscapes and 3D reconstruction of facial features that enable us to look on the faces of ancient man, a technique pioneered in Manchester.
There’s something poignant about the photograph of Flinders Petrie hanging near these displays. How he would have relished the opportunity to use those techniques on his numerous excavations.
Intimate encounters
The second gallery focuses on ancient Egypt, using some of the 16,000 objects from Egypt and Sudan held by the museum.
In contrast to the first gallery, this area is a small enclosed space, with hundreds of objects crammed onto glass shelves – effectively a modern take on a cabinet of curiosities.
This approach is successful, up to a point, though the positioning and visibility of the labels could be improved. The objects are arranged chronologically, the majority being finds from tombs, though there is also material from the site of Kahun.
This city, which was originally excavated by Flinders Petrie, was created for priests and pyramid builders. The artefacts reflect the minutiae of daily life, such as sandals bowls, combs and toys.
There are talking heads here too – the mummy researcher Rosalie David discussing Asru, a chantress at the Temple of Amun in Karnak, whose mummy has been the subject of intensive medical research at Manchester. These investigations are revealing significant new information about the history of disease.
The Manchester Museum’s superb collection of mummy portraits from the Fayum region of Egypt, dating from the Roman period and excavated by Flinders Petrie in the late 19th century, are displayed in a small side room.
These astonishing 2,000-year-old portraits allow us to look into the faces of Roman people. Displaying these portraits in an intimate space was inspired, as it allows visitors to see them undisturbed.
Old and new
Upstairs, the final gallery, Exploring Objects, aims to answer the question of why museums have so much stuff and why most of it is in store. It’s an interesting idea for a museum to address this, but the gallery doesn’t really deliver the answer.
The space is tricky, a mezzanine gallery with views down to the ancient Egypt gallery below. It is lined with cases along two walls and a large screen at one end, which features 3D projections of objects. But there is little room for visitors to move about.
Along one wall are massed rows of Egyptian artefacts – shabti, jewellery and other objects – in visible storage. Some items are fixed so they can be handled.
Along the other wall are examples of fakes, displays on conservation and an installation by the artist Richard Wentworth, creating “museum collections” from objects bought in poundshops and supermarkets.
In a text panel superimposed on a case (the low light levels make it almost impossible to read), he urges us to “see our stores as tombs” – a particular irony, given that part of the funding for the redevelopment came from two of the Sainsbury family trusts.
Ancient Worlds is an interesting mix of old and new. The traditional cabinet of curiosities approach is matched by the use of mobile technology to supplement museum labels with information available digitally, offering additional information on more than 1,000 objects and 3D photography of 50 key items.
Jane Weeks is a museum consultant
The museum’s ancient Egypt and archaeology collections are of international importance and, following a major development project, have been magnificently redisplayed in three new galleries, which also reveal the beauty of the architecture of the Alfred Waterhouse-designed building.
And, given that the Manchester Museum is the UK’s largest university museum, the results of some of the research undertaken into the collections is on display.
The first gallery looks at our relationship with the past, the archaeological techniques used to comprehend it and how our understanding is coloured by the world today.
The space is large and light-filled with waist-high glass cases showing an eclectic selection of artefacts from the museum’s collections. Many are on display for the first time.
The objects range from the significant, such as the 2nd-century Manchester Wordsquare, to the everyday, the broken dinner plates, chipped tea cups and other detritus of early 20th-century life revealed by the Sandhills Cottages Project, which researched a row of cottages demolished in the 1950s and conducted interviews with some of the former occupants.
Hanging from the ceiling are graphics and screens focusing on Manchester’s contribution to archaeology.
These include Thomas Barritt, an 18th-century saddlemaker and collector of antiquities; pioneering archaeologist Sir Flinders Petrie, whose excavations were funded by Manchester businessman Jesse Haworth; Barri Jones, former professor of archaeology at the University of Manchester; and Alan Garner, author of the 1960s children’s cult fantasy novel, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen.
The positioning of the screens makes it feel as though you are part of a conversation.
This gallery also showcases new scientific techniques used for archaeological research, such as the analysis of ancient landscapes and 3D reconstruction of facial features that enable us to look on the faces of ancient man, a technique pioneered in Manchester.
There’s something poignant about the photograph of Flinders Petrie hanging near these displays. How he would have relished the opportunity to use those techniques on his numerous excavations.
Intimate encounters
The second gallery focuses on ancient Egypt, using some of the 16,000 objects from Egypt and Sudan held by the museum.
In contrast to the first gallery, this area is a small enclosed space, with hundreds of objects crammed onto glass shelves – effectively a modern take on a cabinet of curiosities.
This approach is successful, up to a point, though the positioning and visibility of the labels could be improved. The objects are arranged chronologically, the majority being finds from tombs, though there is also material from the site of Kahun.
This city, which was originally excavated by Flinders Petrie, was created for priests and pyramid builders. The artefacts reflect the minutiae of daily life, such as sandals bowls, combs and toys.
There are talking heads here too – the mummy researcher Rosalie David discussing Asru, a chantress at the Temple of Amun in Karnak, whose mummy has been the subject of intensive medical research at Manchester. These investigations are revealing significant new information about the history of disease.
The Manchester Museum’s superb collection of mummy portraits from the Fayum region of Egypt, dating from the Roman period and excavated by Flinders Petrie in the late 19th century, are displayed in a small side room.
These astonishing 2,000-year-old portraits allow us to look into the faces of Roman people. Displaying these portraits in an intimate space was inspired, as it allows visitors to see them undisturbed.
Old and new
Upstairs, the final gallery, Exploring Objects, aims to answer the question of why museums have so much stuff and why most of it is in store. It’s an interesting idea for a museum to address this, but the gallery doesn’t really deliver the answer.
The space is tricky, a mezzanine gallery with views down to the ancient Egypt gallery below. It is lined with cases along two walls and a large screen at one end, which features 3D projections of objects. But there is little room for visitors to move about.
Along one wall are massed rows of Egyptian artefacts – shabti, jewellery and other objects – in visible storage. Some items are fixed so they can be handled.
Along the other wall are examples of fakes, displays on conservation and an installation by the artist Richard Wentworth, creating “museum collections” from objects bought in poundshops and supermarkets.
In a text panel superimposed on a case (the low light levels make it almost impossible to read), he urges us to “see our stores as tombs” – a particular irony, given that part of the funding for the redevelopment came from two of the Sainsbury family trusts.
Ancient Worlds is an interesting mix of old and new. The traditional cabinet of curiosities approach is matched by the use of mobile technology to supplement museum labels with information available digitally, offering additional information on more than 1,000 objects and 3D photography of 50 key items.
Jane Weeks is a museum consultant
Project data
- Cost £1.57m
- Main funders Heritage Lottery Fund £772,000; Garfield Weston Foundation; Monument Trust; Headley Trust; Stavros Niarchos Foundation; Foundation for Sport and the Arts; Barker Foundation; Charlotte Bonham-Carter Charitable Trust
- Exhibition design Opera Amsterdam
- Display cases ClickNetherfield
