Ashmolean redux: the Egyptian collection

Two years after The Leisure Review reported on completion of the first phase of the Ashmolean’s redevelopment programme, Jonathan Ives dropped in to have a look at phase two, a £5-million project to open six new galleries for the museum’s collections of Ancient Egypt and Nubia.

The Leisure Review

Needle work for ancient coffin

For nine months, experts at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK, have been using a hyperdermic needle and catheter tubing to slowly restore a single 2,750-year-old coffin. 

A small team of conservators are finishing their painstaking work to restore and preserve dozens of Ancient Egyptian artefacts in time for the grand opening of the new £5m galleries next month. 

The new galleries of Ancient Egypt and Nubia will open to the public on Saturday, November 26, and set to boost visitor numbers to new record levels. 

Head of conservation Mark Norman told the Oxford Mail: “In the entire collection there are about 50,000 objects, although a lot of that is archaeological material not suitable for public display."

Ashmolean Museum: Egypt meets Greece and Rome

The massive project of redisplaying a selection of the 40,000 artefacts in the Oxford's Ashmolean Museum’s world-renowned Egyptian collections is in its closing stages. The Egypt galleries re-open to the public on Saturday, 26th November following a £5 million makeover – the galleries undergoing complete remodelling and refurbishment since closure in September 2010

And November's issue of Oxfordshire Limited Edition magazine will be writing about the 6th gallery - ‘Egypt meets Greece and Rome'.

This gallery covers the final phase of ancient Egyptian history, beginning after Alexander the Great of Macedon had conquered much of Egypt, releasing the country from Persian rule, and founding the city of Alexandria. After his death in 323 BC, a general of Alexander’s declared himself king - as Ptolemy I.

Thus began the Ptolemaic dynasty, ruling Egypt for nearly three centuries. Ptolemaic rule ended with Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony defeated by Octavian (subsequently the first Roman emperor Augustus) at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC. Egypt then became a province of the Roman Empire.

Ashmolean Museum: tour of the new galleries continues

Worshiping the divine cats of Re and Atum. Limestone, painted and inscribed in black over red draft lines: ht 21 cm. From Deir el-Medina, 19th Dynasty, c. 1292 – 1190 BC

Our journey through ancient Egyptian history via the Ashmolean’s new Egypt galleries now brings us to about 1280 BC and the Ramesside Period.

The Amarna interlude is left behind, the pantheon of ancient Egyptian gods reinstated, Akhenaten’s temples dismantled and all traces of the heretic pharaoh removed, and the capital moved to Memphis.

The Theban region is growing in power and great building works begin. And the greatest builder of them all, Ramesses II rides high, recording his military triumphs and creating gargantuan statues of himself and his queen, Nefertari. All is right with the world . . .

But not quite. The fifth gallery in the series, Egypt in the Age of Empires, divides into two halves. The first concentrates on the Late New Kingdom. This was when many of the tombs in the Valley of the Kings were constructed.

Ramesses II — one of 11 pharaohs of this name during the 19th and 20th Dynasties — builds massively during a 65-year-long reign, constructing temples in all major cities, the most famous being the rock cut temple at Abu Simbel. But he is also waging war, protecting his country’s borders against invaders, chiefly the Hittites.

The second half of the room deals with Egypt’s decline.

One of the first things you see here is an almost metre high limestone stela (an inscribed slab of stone or wood) covered in hieroglyphic inscriptions and images. It comes from a temple built by Ramesses II dedicated to the god Min at Koptos (see June’s Oxfordshire Limited Edition).

The right side of the stela shows the pharaoh honouring the goddess Isis by casting incense pellets onto a burner. The left side shows Isis making a processional voyage in a boat carried by priests. The text records the answer Isis as oracle gave to a question asked by an official named Penre (the exact question he posed is not known as details are missing, but it seems he was asking the goddess about a promotion).

After that, the gallery takes a good look at the people who built and decorated the tombs in the Valley of the Kings. A lot is known about their lives because of the ostraca, papyri, writing boards and wooden labels they left behind (an ostracon is a piece of limestone or pottery used as a writing surface).

The Ashmolean holds a vast collection of these, and a selection can be seen in the gallery’s new drawer units.

They vary from sketches to receipts for donkey hire, writing exercises to lists of deliveries, from a dispute over a hut to a man’s reason for having a day off — he was bitten by a scorpion!

The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, UK, opens the new galleries of Ancient Egypt and Nubia (present day Sudan) on Saturday 26 November 2011

Ashmolean Museum opens new Ancient Egypt and Nubia Galleries on 26 November 2011

The Ashmolean Museum has announced the opening date of the new galleries of Ancient Egypt and Nubia (present day Sudan) on Saturday 26 November 2011.

This second phase of major redevelopment will redisplay the world-renowned Egyptian collections and exhibit objects that have been in storage for decades, more than doubling the number of mummies and coffins on display. The new galleries will take visitors on a chronological journey covering more than 5000 years of human occupation of the Nile Valley.

The £5 million project has received lead support from Lord Sainsbury’s Linbury Trust, along with the Selz Foundation and other trusts, foundations and individuals. Rick Mather Architects are leading the redesign and display of four existing Egyptian galleries and the extension into the restored Ruskin Gallery, previously occupied by the Museum Shop.

New openings link the rooms, presenting the collections under the broad themes of Egypt at its Origins; Dynastic Egypt and Nubia; Life after Death in Ancient Egypt; The Amarna ‘Revolution’; Egypt in the Age of Empire; and Egypt meets Greece and Rome.

Life and death ... and the Ashmolean Museum

The nested coffins of Djeddjehutyiuefankh, a 7th century BC member of a family of Theban priests © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

The August Oxfordshire Limited Edition looks at life after death in ancient Egypt as part of its series of articles on the new suite of Egyptian galleries (Dynastic Egypt and Nubia), opening at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK, in the last week of November.

Life after death is what most of people think of first when considering Ancient Egypt. Certainly, visiting school parties delight in mummies, coffins, tombs, treasures, kings, curses, deities that have to be appeased.

Then there are the colourful tomb paintings, telling the stories of gods, goddesses and strange creatures on the perilous path to the afterlife.

The ‘Life After Death in Ancient Egypt’ gallery at the Ashmolean Museum, the third of in the sequence of five new Egyptian galleries opening at the end of November, will include all of these hopefully minus any curses!

Much of what is understood about life and death in ancient Egypt and their belief systems stems from studies of tomb contents and decoration: the results of a host of late 19th and 20th century excavations.

The Ashmolean has an extensive collection of funerary material, so with new displays to look forward to, it promises to be a fascinating room.

Taking centre stage, opposite the gallery entrance, is an exceptional set of nested coffins made of painted wood. They belonged to Djeddjehutyiuefankh, a 7th century BC member of a family of Theban priests.

Djed-djehuty-iuef-ankh means: Says the god Thoth, ‘May he live’.

Living during the 25th Dynasty, from 770-712 BC, Djeddjehutyiuefankh’s triple coffin was found, together with his mother’s, buried in the sacred ground of the temple at Deir el-Bahri, Western Thebes.

They were discovered by the Swiss scholar Edouard Naville, the first archaeologist to work for the Egypt Exploration Fund.

The Deir el-Bahri temple complex built by the formidable Queen Hatshepsut 700 years earlier is a vast part-rock-hewn, part-freestanding building with ramps, terraces and colonnades found within a steep semicircle of cliffs.

It is considered one of the great buildings of the world, and typically is a highlight of a trip to the nearby Valley of the Kings.

To register for the e-edition of Oxfordshire Limited Edition click HERE. You will be emailed when the magazine is available.

Ashmolean Museum: profiling the spectacular Shrine of Taharqa

Next month Oxfordshire Limited Edition looks at the second gallery in the new suite of Egyptian galleries (Dynastic Egypt and Nubia), opening at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK,  in the last week of November. 

In particular the magazine profiles the spectacular Shrine of Taharqa standing at its centre. This large sandstone shrine built by King Taharqa (690-664 BC) is the only freestanding pharaonic building in the country — and at four metres square is also the biggest object in the Ashmolean Museum. It is an impressive building. And from now on, in its new setting, Taharqa’s shrine will be even more imposing. 

Liam McNamara, assistant keeper for Ancient Egypt and Sudan at the museum, who is in charge of the new displays, said: “We want to try to give a sense of the shrine’s original setting — that is part of a temple complex.

“I have heard visitors sometimes call it a ‘tomb’, but this is not the case. The shrine would have been in a dark enclosed space within the temple,” he said.  “Our idea is to roof a small part of it — the undecorated roof was removed and left behind — and take off the existing hardwood door, leaving an opening so visitors can see inside. I also want to put an object in there — and it will be spot-lit.” 

The shrine was given to the museum in 1936 by the widow of the first Professor of Egyptology at Oxford, Francis Llewellyn Griffith (1862-1934). 

He led successive seasons of the Oxford University Excavations in Nubia from 1910 onwards; including recovering Taharqa’s shrine from the sand in the temple of Amun-Re (Amon-Re) at Kawa, together with the wall of a second shrine built a century later by a succeeding king, Aspelta. 

To register for the e-edition of Oxfordshire Limited Edition click HERE. You will be emailed when the magazine is available.

Preview Ashmolean's Egyptian galleries

Don't forget to register for the edition of Oxfordshire Limted Edition with the first of a series of articles previewing the Ashmolean Museum’s new Egyptian galleries. To register for the e-edition of Oxfordshire Limited Edition click HERE. You will be emailed when the magazine is available.

The museum’s Egyptian Galleries reopen the week beginning November 28 following a complete transformation. There will be five galleries in future. The four existing galleries, redesigned and redisplayed, plus a fifth created in the tall stuccoed gallery that until the turn of the year was occupied by the museum shop.

Read all about it: Ashmolean Museum’s new Egyptian galleries

Just to let you know that the first of a series of articles previewing the Ashmolean Museum’s new Egyptian galleries is now available from Oxfordshire Limted Edition, the award-winning monthly magazine published with The Oxford Times. The paper magazine is published today and the e-edition will be available soon.

To register for the e-edition of Oxfordshire Limited Edition click HERE. You will be emailed when the magazine is available.

The museum’s Egyptian Galleries reopen the week beginning November 28 following a complete transformation. There will be five galleries in future. The four existing galleries, redesigned and redisplayed, plus a fifth created in the tall stuccoed gallery that until the turn of the year was occupied by the museum shop.

The £5m project to create a new sequence of Egypt galleries is the second phase of the Ashmolean’s redevelopment.

The Egypt galleries are one of the Ashmolean’s major attractions — the ancient Egyptian and Nubian collections are second only to those in the British Museum — holding around 40,000 objects, and spanning all periods from prehistory to the 7th century AD. The Predynastic and Early Dynastic holdings are particularly strong.

From now until December Oxfordshire Limited Edition readers will be able to ‘visit’ each of the new galleries in turn, focussing on an object or two in each and a key archaeologist whose story will be told there. 

Ashmolean Museum’s new Egyptian galleries to open in November

Hippopotamus. Course red pottery, found in grave R134 at Hu, L 27.3 cm,  of Predynastic date (c.3500-3000 BC). AN1899-1908E3267 © Ashmolean Museum,  University of Oxford

On June 2nd a new series begins in Oxfordshire Limted Edition, the award-winning monthly magazine published with The Oxford Times, previewing the Ashmolean Museum’s new Egyptian galleries, scheduled to open in November. 

Horus, Bes, Min, Sobek, Amun-Ra, Akhenaten, Nefertiti, Ramesses, Thoth — names such as these won’t have been on your lips on recent visits to the Ashmolean Museum. But, they will again later this year, in the last week of November, when the museum’s much loved Egyptian Galleries reopen following a complete transformation.

There will be five galleries in future. The four existing galleries, redesigned and redisplayed, plus a fifth created in the tall stuccoed gallery that until the turn of the year was occupied by the museum shop.

The £5m project to create a new sequence of Egypt galleries is the second phase of the Ashmolean’s redevelopment. It builds on the stunning success of the 2006-9 transformation of the main museum that saw visitor numbers leap to 1.2 million in the first year. That is more than four times the previous annual average. The project is again led by award-winning Rick Mather Architects, supported by Lord Sainsbury’s Linbury Trust.

The Egypt galleries are one of the Ashmolean’s major attractions — the ancient Egyptian and Nubian collections are second only to those in the British Museum — holding around 40,000 objects, and spanning all periods from prehistory to the 7th century AD. The Predynastic and Early Dynastic holdings are particularly strong.

From now until December, with the help of the Ashmolean’s assistant keeper for Ancient Egypt and Sudan, Liam McNamara who is planning the new displays,  Oxfordshire Limited Edition readers will be able to ‘visit’ each of the new galleries in turn, focussing on an object or two in each and a key archaeologist whose story will be told there.

The Egypt galleries are due to open the week beginning November 28. Visit the website by clicking HERE.

To register for the e-edition of Oxfordshire Limited Edition click HERE.

Hippopotami abounded in prehistoric Egypt, to judge by the many models that have survived. Associated by the ancient Egyptians with the deity Taweret, protectress of babies and mothers in childbirth, today they inhabit the river no further north than Khartoum. Given by the Egypt Exploration Fund, 1899.

Ashmolean receives planning permission for new Egyptian galleries

From winter 2010, the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK, will begin the redevelopment of its Egyptian galleries housed in Charles Cockerell’s Grade -1 listed Beaumont Street Building.

Leading the project will be the award-winning practice Rick Mather Architects, who designed the Museum’s new building. This next phase will complete the Ashmolean’s Ancient World Floor, comprising galleries that span the world’s great ancient civilisations – from Egypt and Nubia, Prehistoric Europe, the Ancient Near East, Classical Greece and Rome, to Early India, China and Japan.

With lead support from Lord Sainsbury’s Linbury Trust, the new £5 million project will redesign and redisplay the four existing Egypt galleries, and create a fifth gallery in the space currently occupied by the Shop. It will address the problems of the old galleries which have crowded displays, poor lighting and limited environmental controls. The rooms will be linked with new doorways allowing the collections to be presented under broad themes which they so strongly represent: Egypt at its Origins; Dynastic Egypt and Nubia; Life and Death in Ancient Egypt; Egypt in the Age of Empire; and Egypt Meets Greece and Rome.

Beard Construction, who have successfully completed a number of small projects for the Museum in recent years, have won the contract to carry out the project’s building works, including the relocation of the Shop into a newly converted space next to the Café on the lower-ground floor. Starting in October 2010, the Egyptian galleries will begin to close to make way for the new displays and will be closed completely from 1 January 2011. The new galleries will open in winter 2011.

The Ashmolean is home to some of the finest Egyptian collections in the country, with Predynastic and Protodynastic material which ranks amongst the best in the world.

Collected over 300 years, the Ashmolean’s Egyptian holdings tell some of the most interesting stories of archaeological discovery, which have made Egyptology so popular and fascinating. Amongst the names associated with the Museum’s collections are the prolific nineteenth century traveller and collector GJ Chester; Arthur Evans who saw that the Ashmolean should receive a share of the excavations carried out in the 1890s; and WMF Petrie, the most famous of the early Egyptologists.

Over the years the museum has amassed iconic pieces such as Petrie’s excavation of the wallpainting of the Daughters of Akhenaten and Nefertiti, the complete free-standing Shrine of Taharqa discovered by Frank Griffith in 1930; and the fabulous limestone Min statues which date to 3300 BC. The Ashmolean’s Egyptian collections now number close to 40,000 artefacts.

The redevelopment of the Egypt galleries will build on the success of the first phase of transformation at the Ashmolean which addressed the most urgent challenges of the old museum, namely conservation, interpretation and accessibility. Housed in an extension designed by Rick Mather, the new Ashmolean was officially opened by Her Majesty The Queen in December 2009 and has received both critical and public acclaim and a host of prestigious awards. Since it opened in November 2009 the museum has received more than one million visitors.