World Museums: Museum of Art and Archaeology of Oxford opens new Ancient Egypt and Nubia galleries

On November 26 2011 the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology (Oxford, England) is opening its new galleries of Ancient Egypt and Nubia (present day Sudan) as a part of a major project for museum’s redevelopment and extension.

The new galleries 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. 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.

With new lighting, display cases and interpretation, the project 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.  

Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, said, "These remarkable collections are among the most important outside Egypt and one of the Ashmolean’s most popular attractions. With an exciting series of new galleries, this significant redevelopment will both transform the opportunities for using the collections for teaching and research at all levels and the way they are enjoyed, cared for and integrated within the wider Museum, well into the future.”

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. Over the years the Museum has amassed iconic pieces such as the wallpainting depicting the daughters of Akhenaten and Nefertiti; the Shrine of Taharqa from the temple at Kawa – the only complete free-standing pharaonic building in Britain; and the colossal limestone statues of the fertility god Min which date to 3300 BC. The Ashmolean’s Egyptian collections now number more than 40,000 artefacts.

The Museum of Art and Archaeology which bears the name of Elias Ashmole – a celebrated English antiquary, politician, collector of antiquities, astrologer and student of alchemy – opened in 1683 to house his collection of curiosities. This is Oxford University’s museum and is the oldest public museum in Great Britain.