The Egyptian Collection at Norwich Castle Museum: Catalogue and Essays

By Faye Kalloniatis

The Egyptian Collection at Norwich Castle Museum represents the first full publication of this important collection which contains several outstanding objects.



Part 1 begins with an outline of the acquisition history of the Egyptian collection and its display within Norwich Castle in 1894, when it was converted from a prison to a museum. The collection was largely acquired between the nineteenth and first part of the twentieth centuries. Its most prominent donor was Flaxman Spurrell, whose varied collection of flints, faience beads and necklaces as well as Late Antique cloths was obtained from Sir Flinders Petrie. Also prominent was the Norwich-based Colman family, most notable for its manufacture of mustard, whose collection was purchased in Egypt during the late-C19. Also included in this part are essays on several of the museum’s outstanding items – Ipu’s shroud, a rare early 18th Dynasty example with fragments also held in Cairo; the 22nd Dynasty finely decorated and well-preserved cartonnage and wooden lid of the priest, Ankh-hor; and the exceptional model granary of Nile clay painted with lively scenes, one showing the owner, Intef, playing senet.



Part 2 is a detailed catalogue of the complete collection. It is organised into sections with objects grouped together mainly according to type – stelae, shabtis, scarabs, jewellery, amulets, vessels, flints, lamps, inscribed Book of the Dead fragments, metal figurines, and Late Antique cloths; and also according to function – such as cosmetics& grooming, and architectural & furniture elements. The inscribed materials have all been translated and individual entries give examples or parallels. Seventy colour plates illustrate each object.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Oxbow Books
• Release date: Aug 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9781789251975

Faye Kalloniatis

Faye Kalloniatis is an Honorary Research Associate at Norwich Castle Museum. She works on the Egyptian collection and helps to curate it. She is also involved as editor with the M.i.N. project (‘Museums in the Nile Delta’), a project which researches and publishes some of the lesser-known treasures on display in the various small museums spread across the Nile Delta.

Book preview

PART 1

Essays on the Norwich Collection

– 1 –

The Egyptian Collection at Norwich Castle Museum

Faye Kalloniatis

INTRODUCTION

With a ‘fanfare of trumpets’ coupled with a royal visit, Norwich Castle Museum was opened (fig 1). The occasion was heralded in the local newspaper thus: ‘So far as the Norwich Castle is concerned, the Good Times Have Come’.¹ The city had had a museum since 1824/5. Originally located in the city centre at the Haymarket, over the decades it moved several times before its relocation to the Castle in 1894.² The Castle, rising prominently on a man-made mound, was a landmark ancient building whose construction had begun in the latter part of the 11th century. Centuries later, when it came to house the museum, the building was transformed and the museum, as an institution, was also greatly changed from what it had been when at the Haymarket. Whereas the latter had not been a public institution but rather, an organisation more akin to a private (men’s) club reserved exclusively for research and study, by the time it was relocated to the Castle it had fundamentally changed in character. It now became a public institution, maintained by the municipality and ‘accessible to all classes of the people’.³ Its doors were to be opened to the public for free and its visiting hours would be extended to include a few evenings.⁴ So, from the outset, Norwich Castle Museum was to differ from its predecessors in its ethos and guiding principles.

Equally radical would be the reorganisation of the Castle’s interior. Even before its nineteenth century transformation into a museum, the building’s function had changed and it had for centuries served as a prison.⁵ This would make the task of transforming a dark and forbidding interior into a light and elevated space a challenging one. The architect appointed to do this was Edward Boardman. He consulted widely and looked beyond Norwich to ascertain what type of inner spaces would be appropriate for a ‘modern museum’.⁶ There were two distinct areas which Boardman had to redesign – the ancient Castle Keep itself, which in ground plan was more or less square, and the substantial adjoining prison buildings, which had been added over the years and had a roughly octagonal ground plan. The octagonal space was converted into a series of spacious galleries – the internal prison structures were dismantled and replaced by cabinets in which the collections could be displayed. As for the ancient Castle Keep, it too was converted into a large open space, which, in addition to its main floor, was given an upper galleried landing or balcony that provided yet more space for museum displays.

The museum’s collections consisted mainly of natural history specimens, as was typical of provincial museums at that time.⁷ There was an extensive mix of birds, mammals and reptiles. In addition, there was minerology and geology as well as paintings with a local connection (the so-called Norwich School of Artists). All were to be displayed according to the thinking of the day and not as the ‘heterogeneous’⁸ displays of the Old Museum in St Andrews St, where the visitor was greeted by incomprehensible and meaningless juxtapositions, such as a giraffe in close proximity to a mummy and coffin.⁹ Instead, the Castle’s ample space avoided such odd placements of objects and allowed for the separation of unrelated collections. The natural history specimens could be arranged in scientific order, with reptiles and birds each placed in their own spaces and grouped on the basis of evolution and chronology;¹⁰ and national and foreign collections could also be separated, an approach which was at that time encouraged.¹¹

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1 The opening of Norwich Castle Museum by the Duke and Duchess of York in October 1894: speeches and celebrations in the Castle Keep.

© Norfolk Museums Service

The ‘scientific’ arrangement of the natural history collection was relatively straightforward, but the arrangement of the museum’s foreign archaeology, which included the Egyptian collection, was more problematic. Not only was it a small collection but, since it had been acquired randomly – through private donations rather than through active collecting designed to acquire objects which could tell a coherent story as well as fill any gaps in the collection – it was inevitably unrepresentative. This was not unique to Norwich. Minor, unrepresentative collections were a reality for small, provincial museums. Hence, when it came to developing displays for these collections, museums found it difficult to arrange them along the recommended scientific and chronological lines which typified the natural history displays. This was recognised by the writer and Egyptologist, Annie Quibell, who said of small Egyptian collections that ‘it is generally impossible to separate out Egyptian objects one from the other enough to show the sequence; moreover, there are apt to be periods quite unrepresented...’.¹² All this was true for Norwich’s Egyptian collection, which by the 1890s amounted to fewer than 150 items. This doubtless contributed to the museum’s decision to initially assign a low priority in setting up the Egyptian display when moving premises from St Andrews St to the Castle. Attention was instead lavished on the large natural history collection.

The transfer of the museum’s extensive collections to the Castle was a major undertaking and as the sole curator in charge, James Reeve took some time to achieve this (fig 2). He had been working on the redisplays before the official opening in October 1894 – an occasion which was to include a tour of a few of the completed galleries. The area least touched was the Castle Keep itself since it was there that the many invited guests and dignitaries were to be seated during the opening ceremony. It was in this space, with its generous open plan and wide-galleried landing, that Reeve intended to house the Egyptian display along with other ethnographical and foreign archaeological exhibits. Yet, inspite of the low priority given to these displays at this early stage, Reeve nevertheless could not resist placing the museum’s two (and only) mummies and their coffins on the main floor in time for the grand opening. Their conspicuous location could not have failed to arouse the curiosity of the many guests who gathered in the Keep for the official opening (fig 3).

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2 James Reeve, curator of the museum at the time of its opening (1894) and until his retirement in 1910.

© Norfolk Museums Service

Reeve’s decision to display the mummies is worth examining within a wider museum context. When mummies first began finding their way into museum collections (before the 19th century), they were objects of curiosity,¹³ poorly understood and poorly interpreted. By the 19th century they were, as far as popular culture was concerned, the symbol of ancient Egypt and had the power to attract and repel in equal measure. On the one hand, they evoked a positive fascination and curiosity about a culture which had long since disappeared and which seemed exotic, mysterious and enticing. On the other hand, they suggested a culture whose practices were ‘barbaric and distasteful’.¹⁴ Both views were equally uninformed. The Norwich mummies reinforced the more sympathetic, if fanciful and exotic, view. Set up in isolation, away from each other in the large, cavernous space of the Castle Keep, and with little interpretation, the public imagination could wander freely. One pamphlet, written at the time of the formal opening of the Castle Museum, reported that these two mummies in their coffins were ‘princesses from Egypt who roamed on the banks of the Nile’¹⁵ – but of course, they were no such thing. One was a male and the other a female in a usurped male coffin. However, the facts were neither known at the time nor sought!¹⁶ Thus, Reeve’s display did little more than to present these items as isolated curiosities – an approach which the well-ordered natural science displays had actively avoided.

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3 View of the Castle Keep shortly after the museum’s opening in 1894. The two mummy cases in the background were the first Egyptian exhibits to be displayed. © Norfolk Museums Service

DISPLAYING THE COLLECTION

In tracing the development of the Egyptian display at Norwich from the mid-1890s onwards the written sources, which include the Museum’s annual reports and official guides, offer frustratingly scant information. However, there is a handful of photographs¹⁷ which can help to fill some of the gaps. The earliest of these shows the newly-transformed Keep, taken shortly after the museum’s opening in 1894 and showing the two mummies lying in separate cases (fig 3).

A later photograph, dating to the late 1920s/30s, shows that one of these mummies together with one newly donated by King George V (in 1928) had by then been transferred to the upper balcony of the Keep. They were placed on either side of a third oak cabinet, the latter filled with Egyptian artefacts and with the stelophorous statue of Roy (cat no 1) placed externally on top of it (fig 4).¹⁸ Later still, these free-standing cabinets were replaced by a larger, single case running along the wall of the Keep. Its considerable height allowed both mummies to be positioned upright and it stood alongside another foreign archaeology display titled ‘Ancient Greece and Rome’ (fig 5).

The written sources confirm this broad outline. The Official Guides of the 1890s show that not much progress had been made in the ‘arrangement’ of this small collection. The 1895 edition states that it was still not completed¹⁹ and in the following year nothing more seems to have been added.²⁰ This lack of progress – in part due to the fact that the Egyptian display had not at that stage been given priority – must also reflect a shortage of curatorial staff with expertise in Egyptology. This highlights an unavoidable reality of provincial museums, whose diverse collections and limited curatorial staff meant that they inevitably could not provide expertise in all of the areas represented in their collections. This was especially so for those with meagre collections in a given discipline, as was true for Norwich which at that time had fewer than 150 Egyptian antiquities. Neither James Reeve, sole curator until 1900, nor Frank Leney, assistant curator from 1900, were trained Egyptologists.

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4 View of the balcony of the Castle Keep. By the late 1920s the expanded Egyptian displays were relocated here. See the cluster of oak cases on the upper left hand side, one with a stelophorous statue sitting on the top. Along the adjacent wall (to the right) are ethnographical displays. © Archant/EDP Library

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5 A later view of the balcony of the Castle Keep. By the 1930s/40s, the Egyptian collection was redisplayed in these tall cases along the Keep wall, next to an adjoining display on ancient Greece and Rome (left of the Egyptian case).

© Norfolk Museums Service

It was not until the turn of the century, after the other galleries had more or less been completed, that attention turned to the Egyptian display and more was done to better understand and interpret it. As part of a general movement across the museum to revise and improve the labelling²¹ and to set up a card catalogue,²² at least one of the mummy coffins had its texts translated and incorporated into the display. This occurred in 1901 when the prominent Oxford Egyptologist, Francis Llewellyn Griffith, was asked to translate the hieroglyphs on one of the mummy coffins.²³ The 1910s saw yet more progress: the display had grown significantly (discussed below) and a proactive effort was made in its ‘arrangement and classification’.²⁴ The museum turned to Canon Johns, an ordained priest and an Assyriologist at Cambridge University, and later to become master of St Catherine’s College. He had earlier (in 1912) worked on some of the museum’s cuneiform tablets²⁵ and subsequently he, along with his wife, were asked to look at the Egyptian display. It was probably at around this time that the mummy cases were moved from the main floor of the Keep and set up on the balcony. By now the exhibits had become more substantial: the 1913 edition of the Official Guide mentions not just the (human) mummies but also some animal mummies, as well as ‘sepulchral figures’ [the shabtis], pottery from the site of Beni Hasan, and a set of cards mounted with small finds illustrating colour pigments.²⁶ Canon and Mrs Johns had, it seems, made substantial improvements (although it appears that their work was never completed).²⁷

THE EGYPTIAN SOCIETY OF EAST ANGLIA

One of the most significant developments for Egyptology in Norwich occurred at the beginning of the twentieth century when the Egyptian Society of East Anglia (ESEA and also referred to hereafter simply as ‘the Society’) was established. It was founded in 1915 and its president was the Egyptologist, Dr Alyward M. Blackman, best known for his valuable work on the tombs at Meir. The Society played a vital role in helping Egyptology to flourish in Norwich and Norfolk. Its association with the Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF) gave it access to significant resources. It helped attract both speakers and excavated finds, which otherwise would not have come to Norfolk. Because of the local Society’s existence, Norwich was on the lecturing ‘circuit’ and was visited by EEF speakers who were sent to talk to groups across the country in order to arouse interest (and subscriptions) for EEF’s work in Egypt. Blackman, as the Society’s president, visited Norwich annually and gave talks, often using the museum’s collection as illustration.²⁸ In addition, the Society was on EEF’s list of distributions of excavated finds (see below).

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6 G.V. Barnard, the museum’s first female curator (1937– 1951). She gave talks on the Egyptian collection and arranged many of the specimens donated by the Egypt Exploration Society.

© Norfolk Museums Service

Hence, this local Society became an invaluable partner for Norwich Castle Museum, and the then curators, Frank Leney, curator since 1910, and Miss G.V. Barnard, appointed assistant curator in 1928 and later to become the first female curator at the museum (fig 6), both appreciated the Society’s efforts and offered support by attending its meetings and by giving occasional talks to the group. They also provided ready access to the museum’s collection and free use of its premises for meetings, study circles and talks. The positive impact which the Society had was acknowledged by the museum’s vice-chairman, who reported that the Society was doing ‘exactly the kind of work that the museum committee wishes, in studying specimens in the museum collection and helping to make them better understood’.²⁹ An illustration of this is an undated reference mentioning a ‘Framed exhibit showing Egyptian methods of weaving. Compiled in Museum’,³⁰ and one in which the Society was very likely to have had a hand in developing. Thus, the expertise of the local ESEA members helped the museum to better understand its growing collection, and to more fully interpret it for the benefit of visitors.

The Society also helped to broaden the museum’s edu cational appeal. Largely through the untiring efforts of its honorary secretary, Alice Geldart, ESEA raised awareness and interest in ancient Egypt and actively worked with the museum in support of its educational work with children and with adults.³¹ Geldart promoted the collection by contacting local (sometimes unlikely) groups to offer them guided tours and museum talks³² and she did not stint in what she offered her audiences. A session could variously include: a formal talk; a walk through the gallery; the handling of duplicate objects from the collection; and access to reference books.³³ The Society also curated an exhibition at the museum in 1932. This was part of a national programme of exhibitions throughout the UK set up in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Egypt Exploration Society (EES, as EEF was now called). The Norwich display included ‘a small collection of antiquities from Tell el Amarna from [the Egypt Exploration Society’s] recent excavations’.³⁴ The ceaseless and wide-ranging work of the local Society increased the impact of the museum’s Egyptian collection within Norwich and across the county.

Another significant benefit to the museum of having the local Society as an informal partner was related to the collection. The Society was on EES’s distribution list; subscribing organisations on this ‘list’ were annually sent a selection of finds from EES’s excavations. This was at a time when, due to a system of ‘partage’, excavators were permitted to keep some of their finds by agreement with the Egyptian authorities.³⁵ Museums and organisations throughout Britain (and across the world) benefitted from these distributions. In Norwich, ESEA regularly received Egyptian material; it came packaged, together with lists naming the objects and giving their provenance. In the early years of ESEA’s foundation, this material was sent directly to Geldart in her capacity as secretary. Over the years it seems that she ‘redistributed’ it, that is, she passed at least some on to other of the local ESEA members and in this way it came to be in ‘scattered keeping’.³⁶ Leney, the museum’s curator, realised that if the artefacts were to ‘survive’ they needed a permanent home and so he suggested that they be placed in the museum for safekeeping. The Society agreed to this and in 1926 the finds were deposited at the museum. Once there, Leney purchased a cabinet in which they were ‘arranged and labelled so as to be more easily accessible and far more instructive’.³⁷ In this way Norwich Castle Museum indirectly benefitted from EES’s distribution list. (Norwich was not alone in this; from the late 19th until well into the 20th century EES helped to stock many provincial museums).³⁸ These artefacts eventually became part of the museum’s permanent collection.

The important role that the Society played in promoting Egyptology and in helping to advance the museum’s remit was readily acknowledged by the museum, which in 1918 recorded that it (the Society) had helped to transform the museum so that it was no longer ‘a mere wonder house of dead things’ but, rather, ‘the exhibits properly interpreted . . . render[ed] the Castle Museum alive with interest’.³⁹ There is no doubt that the cooperative efforts between the local Society and Norwich Museum led to marked improvements in the interpretation and display of the collection and so it was a blow when in 1942 the Society folded following the death of the energetic Geldart. After that time the museum’s focus on ancient Egypt diminished as can clearly be seen in the following correspondence of 1948, six years after ESEA’s demise. In a reply by the then curator, Frank Leney, to a letter from Hilda Petrie asking for annual grants in return for the museum being reinstated onto the distribution list, Leney wrote that, since the Society was now defunct, there was ‘little possibility’ that Norwich would make any more grants towards foreign archaeology.⁴⁰ Indeed, after 1942, the number of private donations coming into the museum was significantly reduced (see below).

THE SALE TO LIVERPOOL

Then came the events of the 1950s, which were to further sideline and marginalise the museum’s foreign archaeology collections. By that time, the national mood, at least as far as provincial museums were concerned, was for rationalisation through regionalisation.⁴¹ The ever-burgeoning collections of municipal museums, which often had no well-defined collecting policy, resulted in overstocked storage spaces and led to a cry for ‘declutterisation’.⁴² It is fair to say that this changing direction in museums was due as much to practical necessity as to any underlying museum principles or policies. In Norwich, the museum’s then curator, Rainbird Clarke, instigated discussions which were to have far-reaching ramifications for the Egyptian collection. In July 1952 Clarke addressed the museum committee to argue for a regional remit, based on an understanding that the collections had come together over time ‘without any collecting policy or coherent plan, and the presence of many exhibits [was] largely fortuitous’.⁴³ He was careful to point out that a regional focus, if adopted, would inevitably have consequences – while it would streamline the museum’s collections, it would necessitate the disposal of any material which did not fit the new remit.⁴⁴

Two areas identified by Clarke were ethnography and foreign archaeology. The outcome of subsequent discussions was that consultants should be appointed to con sider the implications for the Norwich collection and to make recommendations. For foreign archaeology, two men were invited to undertake this task – the Reverend J.F. Williams and Dr D.B. Harden. Williams was a local historian/antiquarian with an especial interest in ecclesiastical history,⁴⁵ while Harden was an Oxford academic – an Egyptologist and keeper at the Ashmolean Museum. He was also on the committee of the Egypt Exploration Society during the 1950s.⁴⁶

It is unclear whether these two men ever submitted written reports (none are traceable) but their views may be inferred by the subsequent actions taken by the museum. In January 1953 it adopted Rainbird Clarke’s proposal, which then became known as the Development Plan.⁴⁷ Based on the premise that the museum would in future limit itself to the region of ‘Norfolk and Lothingland in NE Suffolk’, the necessary steps were taken for the disposal of any collections now judged to lie outside of that remit. Decisions were made as to which of the Egyptian antiquities were to be disposed of and these were sold to Liverpool. The process of disposal (in excess of 2,000 Egyptian artefacts as well as reference books) took several years. Most of the packing and relocation to Liverpool was completed by 1956 but it was not until June 1958 that the very last of the antiquities were transferred.

The choice of Liverpool as the new home for the Norwich collection was not a random one. Liverpool had suffered bomb damage in 1941 and so was keen to rebuild its Egyptology.⁴⁸ Within the museum community there was a recognition of and sympathy with Liverpool’s situation. Even before the early 1950s (when Rainbird Clarke raised the issue of disposal) the previous Norwich curator, Miss Barnard, had been keen to help her Liverpool colleagues. In 1949 she had written to Harden to say: ‘I always had it in mind that we might be able to help Liverpool to get going again...’.⁴⁹ Harden passed this on to J.H. Iliffe (the then director of Liverpool Museum), encouraging him to make contact with Norwich. Days later, Iliffe did so and shortly after had a reply from Barnard: ‘You certainly have had a very stiff job at Liverpool, and my feeling is that we should all rally round to give a helping hand where possible’.⁵⁰ Barnard, however, had a permanent loan in mind rather than a sale.⁵¹ It was her successor, Clarke, who pressed for the latter and once the principle of a sale was agreed by the museum committee, Liverpool was considered a strong candidate. It was not the only museum to express an interest; several other institutions were also keen including Amsterdam, Birmingham, Manchester and the university museums of Oxford and Cambridge. However, they only wanted some of the material on offer whereas Liverpool was ready to buy everything and also offered the full asking price.⁵² These factors made it considerably more attractive to Norwich.

Liverpool, for a variety of reasons, proved a fitting home for the Norwich collection. It was a hub for Egyptology in its region and its museum was an important provincial one. Even more than Norwich, it had benefitted from EES’s distributions of excavated finds. In addition, it had at its doorstep the Institute of Archaeology and the University of Liverpool. Associated with these institutions were names such as Professors John Garstang, P.E. Newberry and T.E. Peet. All were prominent Egyptologists who made their mark within the field.

Before concluding this outline of the sale to Liverpool, Harden’s role in Norwich’s Development Plan deserves some scrutiny. A few years before the Norwich sale had even been proposed he had had some contact with Liverpool. In a letter of May 1949 to Iliffe (the Liverpool director), Harden specifically directed him to Norwich as a museum likely to be sympathetic to Liverpool’s search for artefacts to fill the gaps caused by bomb damage.⁵³ So it was at his (Harden’s) prompting that contact between the two museums was instigated at that early stage. Therefore, when in 1952 he was asked to advise Norwich on its proposed Development Plan, it could be argued that he was not an entirely impartial or disinterested party. Further, while on the one hand having supported the disposal of the Norwich collection (and by extension the museum’s proposed narrowing of its remit which had in turn necessitated that disposal), on the other hand, his views regarding museums seeking to redefine and narrow their remit appear ambiguous. In an article written in 1955, only a few years after Norwich’s sale to Liverpool, he in fact argued against the kind of move which Norwich had just taken and which he had helped to influence.⁵⁴ Whatever Harden’s views and motivations, Rainbird Clarke (Norwich’s curator) may have had his own reasons for selecting Harden as consultant. As a strong advocate for disposal and wish ing to advance other schemes within the museum,⁵⁵ Clarke may have welcomed a consultant sympathetic to Liverpool and therefore also to the idea of the disposal of Norwich’s collection. In any case, the die was cast in July 1953 and the Norwich committee began implementing its new Development Plan.

Norwich’s decision to sell a sizeable part of the Egyptian collection should be viewed in the context of its day. It was a move broadly welcomed by many. During the museum’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations in 1954, to which many museum directors were invited, the talk was congratulatory in tone.⁵⁶ Nor was Norwich alone in its dispersal of material. This was echoed in other provincial museums of the day as for instance, Leicester, which sold a substantial part of its ethnographical material and Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery, which had sold some of its collection in the 1950s.⁵⁷ As far as the Norwich sale was concerned, not only had its Egyptian antiquities passed to a museum well placed to make the most of them but they had also remained in public ownership. From the outset, Norwich was very clear that its collection should not disappear into private hands.⁵⁸

Inspite of the drastic reduction of foreign archaeology, some of it was nevertheless retained for ‘introductory exhibits and for the use of the staff for identification purposes’.⁵⁹ Today, Norwich Museum still does not actively collect Egyptian artefacts and only a very few items have been added since the 1950s.⁶⁰ However, its current collection of 500-odd items is still capable of telling a coherent story of ancient Egypt’s material culture. The Colman donation alone (see below), which now constitutes half of the entire Egyptian collection, was viewed in the 19th century by Egyptologists such as Petrie, Quibell and Blackman and all had commented that although ‘small it is a very good and representative one, and contains articles of great interest’, adding that some of its artefacts deserved to be published.⁶¹ Most categories or types of objects are represented and include mummies, amulets, jewellery, shabtis, scarabs and stelae. There are, in addition, several exceptional pieces, of which the rare early 18th Dynasty shroud of Ipu (cat no 367), the model granary (cat no 371), dated to the First Intermediate Period, and the 18th Dynasty bas relief of Queen Ahmose (cat no 347) are three of the most significant.

THE NORWICH COLLECTION

The Collection’s Acquisition History

Archaeological context has always, rightly, been recognised as important. But until more recent times the same has not been true for acquisition history even though this, too, can furnish valuable information about an object, especially when its archaeological context is not, or only partially, known.⁶² To be able to trace an object’s movement or path after excavation – whether from donor to museum, owner to owner, or any other permutation, including all movement after its arrival at a museum – can help provide additional information which might otherwise be lost or remain obscure. An illustration of this, relating to the Norwich collection, concerns a shabti (cat no 9), which is recorded as having come from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo – a fact which helps to explain its distinctive markings (see below for details).⁶³

The Norwich collection was acquired almost exclusively through private donations. Egyptian antiquities came into the museum from the 1820s and continued into the first half of the 20th century, after which very little was received. During that period, two phases or patterns of donation are discernible. The first phase occurred in the 19th century, a time when local museums were ‘receptacles for the donations of private collectors’.⁶⁴ Norwich Castle Museum received a number of items from individuals who each, typically, gave a single or only a few antiquities.⁶⁵ One of the first donations – made in 1825, when the museum was newly opened at the Haymarket – came from a Reverend R. Walpole, who gave an ibis pot (cat no 427). Walpole was not the only reverend to donate Egyptian artefacts and it is interesting to note that one of the appeals of ancient Egypt for the clergy was Egyptology’s then preoccupation with the connection between ancient Egypt and events in the bible.⁶⁶ Other 19th century donors contributed in similar vein, as for instance James Morrison, who gave a mummy (cat no 358) and coffin (cat no 357) and P.E. Wodehouse, who gave three antiquities, only one of which (a fine relief of Ahmose, see cat no 347) is still retained by Norwich. A gift at the very turn of the century (1901) – notable mainly because it was donated by the then curator, James Reeve – was that of two scarabs. How Reeve acquired these pieces is not recorded but they are now in Liverpool.⁶⁷ One 19th century donor, however, proved an exception to this initial pattern of donation. The well-known collector, the Rev. Greville John Chester, gave in excess of 50 antiquities (discussed below).

The second phase of acquisition occurred in the first half of the 20th century, when (in addition to gifts of one or a few objects per donor), more sizeable donations and bequests were received. These helped to substantially swell the Norwich collection. The most significant of these donors were: F.C.J. Spurrell, who gave in excess of 1500 objects; Ethel and Helen Colman, who donated over 250 items; Sir J. and Lady Currie, who bequeathed in excess of 170 objects;⁶⁸ Sir Rider Haggard, who donated nearly 140 objects; the Birkbecks, who gave just over 100 items; J.H.T. Dawson, who donated approximately 40 artefacts; and finally, Gayer-Anderson, whose donation numbered approximately 40 objects (all are discussed below).

In addition to these private donations, yet more were received from the Egypt Exploration Society through its annual distributions, as has already been mentioned. Today, just over a hundred of these antiquities can be traced and the overwhelming majority are now in Liverpool. These artefacts came almost exclusively from two sites – Abydos and Amarna. From Abydos, Norwich received items which had been ‘excavated ... [during 1926–7] in the necropolis [at Abydos] by the EES’.⁶⁹ One of the listed items was the stela of Harmachis (cat no 4). No other objects from this important site have up till now been traced, either in Norwich or Liverpool. A considerably larger quantity of objects came from Amarna. Finds from this site were received nearly every year for over a decade, i.e., between 1924 and 1937.⁷⁰ Lists accompanying these antiquities sometimes specify findspots,⁷¹ for instance: in 1924–25 some came ‘from Town area’;⁷² and in 1929 some came ‘from the northern part of the site, from the various houses’.⁷³ Only two items in Norwich can now be tied to these distribution lists: one is a spindle whorl (see cat no 411); and the other is not an authentic antiquity but a plaster cast which is a copy of the head of an Amarna princess found at that site (see cat no 449 for details).⁷⁴ At Liverpool, however, over one hundred antiquities excavated from Amarna and coming from the Norwich Museum are listed as originally having come from EES’s distribution list.

Following the local Society’s demise in 1942 not only did donations from the Egypt Exploration Society cease but private donations also effectively ceased. By the 1950s, only the occasional antiquity was received and the donors, if they are known at all, generally have little more than their names recorded. As for actual purchases, the museum, in its nearly 200-year history, acquired only a handful of items in this way.

The Collection’s Provenance

A soundly provenanced museum collection adds immeasureably to its archaeological and historical value and significance. The Norwich Museum records a provenance for approximately one quarter of its Egyptian antiquities and includes two instances of several objects originating from the same findspot: one group, said to have come from the same tomb in Gebelein, includes three model baskets (cat nos 374–376), a ball of brewer’s mash (cat no 395), and a now missing piece of linen containing a lock of hair; a second includes a fish-shaped palette (cat no 294) and a piece of malachite (cat no 295), both said to have come from tomb 532 at Naqada.

Some provenances are secure and highly specific such as that of the bas relief of Queen Ahmose (cat no 347) known not only to have come from the temple of Hatshepsut but from the southern wall of the barque hall in the sanctuary of Amun within that temple. Others are considerably less informative such as that for a silver figurine of the god, Min (cat nos 73) said to come ‘from the neighbourhood of the Nile’.

The collection’s acquisition history helps to illuminate some aspects relating to provenance. In particular, knowledge of the donors and of how they acquired their collections sometimes provides valuable information. This is especially true for one of Norwich’s most prominent donors, Flaxman Spurrell, who acquired his antiquities directly from Petrie, and so not only do these objects have a provenance but that provenance is secure (see below). Equally well-sourced was the material acquired by the museum from the Egypt Exploration Society via the local Society (ESEA), as already discussed. In contrast, much of the remaining Norwich collection is less well provenanced, having come from donors who had travelled to Egypt and were eager to purchase antiquities for their private collections but who had no especial interest in or knowledge of ancient Egypt. One collection which typified this was Mrs S. Birkbeck’s (see below).

THE DONORS

As already mentioned, the Norwich Egyptian collection, which at its height consisted in excess of 3,000 items,⁷⁵ came almost entirely from private donations. Approximately half of it was presented by a single donor, F.C.J. Spurrell; a further quarter was given collectively by four other donors – the Colmans, Sir Rider Haggard, Mrs Birkbeck and Sir J. and Lady Currie; and the remaining quarter or so came from roughly 30 other private individuals, each giving one, or at most a handful of items. To varying degrees, the background of these donors has added to what is known about the collection and its provenance.

Flaxman C.J. Spurrell (1842–1915)

Flaxman Spurrell, who made the single, largest, donation to the museum, gave it in two separate ‘instalments’: part of it came during his lifetime in 1904, while the remainder came via his sister as a bequest in 1919 (four years after Spurrell’s death). It was Spurrell’s Norfolk connection that decided him to choose Norwich Castle Museum. He was from a Norfolk family and though much of his life had been lived in Kent, he returned to the family home at Bessingham, Norfolk, in the 1890s and lived there until his death in 1915. Spurrell, a quiet and reclusive man, had amassed a vast number of mainly small finds through one of the most prominent of Egyptologists, Sir Flinders Petrie. The two men had met in England in the 1870s. At that time, both were involved in surveying archaeological sites in Kent. Spurrell was focussed on British palaeolithic archaeology, an area in which he made significant discoveries.⁷⁶ He and Petrie developed a close friendship which was to last until Spurrell’s death. Both were like-minded in their methodology and approach to the archaeological record. Petrie admired and respected Spurrell’s scientific and practical investigations into lithic technology and the manufacture of artefacts. There is ample evidence in Petrie’s letters which shows just how much he valued Spurrell’s opinion and how often he sought it.⁷⁷

Once Petrie began his work in Egypt he frequently contacted Spurrell for assistance of one kind or another. Spurrell helped examine artefacts such as weights⁷⁸ and painting materials (see below). But his greatest contribution by far was his work on flints. His knowledge of lithics was invaluable to Petrie, whose extensive excavations in Egypt were to unearth large numbers of these objects. Petrie was always keen for them to be examined by his friend, and Spurrell willingly obliged. His methodical examination, for instance, of flint flakes excavated from tombs at Meidum, ‘enabled Spurrell to reconstruct the original block, showing how the flaking was done’.⁷⁹ He also contributed chapters and drawings to Petrie’s publications.⁸⁰ Yet, paradoxically, although Spurrell became one of the most significant interpreters of Egyptian lithics, he never once set foot in Egypt.

Spurrell assisted Petrie in practical ways as well. In particular, he helped with Petrie’s annual exhibitions, held after each excavation season. Petrie would bring his finds to London to be exhibited before being distributed to subscribers. This involved much preparation and Spurrell was ever-willing to help in any way possible: he would receive the finds; help to set them up in the hall; ensure that the labelling was done; and finally, pack them in readiness for being sent off to subscribers. He helped with this until 1896.⁸¹

It was doubtless in appreciation of this productive partnership that over the years Petrie presented Spurrell with artefacts. Details of these ‘gifts’ which Spurrell later donated to Norwich Castle Museum are not recorded, but they seem to have come very largely, if not exclusively, from Petrie’s excavations and are mostly of known provenance. For instance, the small flint collection (see Chapter 19) derives mainly from Spurrell’s donations and it is all provenanced, some of it to specific findspots, namely, tombs excavated by Petrie at Naqada (see cat nos 419 & 421).⁸²

Petrie’s and Spurrell’s scientific approach to the archaeological record and their desire to impose order on excavated materials found its practical expression in a series of cards produced by them. Using small finds, they arranged them into groups based on site and/or materials and then mounted them onto card. For instance, Spurrell had been given a ‘series of ochres obtained from paint-pots found in the workshops at Tell el Amarna, Gurob, etc, illustrating the colours used by the Ancient Egyptians in the decoration of Palaces and Temples’.⁸³ These pigments, along with a variety of small artefacts – lithics and vitreous materials – were arranged on cards according to site (Amarna, Hierakonpolis and Gurob) and to material, colour and type.⁸⁴ The cards had once been displayed at Norwich Castle Museum but are now all in Liverpool; however, a few others have remained in Norwich.⁸⁵ In essence, these demonstrate Spurrell’s (and Petrie’s) ‘scientific’ approach in giving order to objects.

For all of these reasons, Spurrell’s donation – totalling in excess of 1500 items – was an important one because nearly all of it had a known and secure provenance. Today Norwich retains just over 60 items, the rest having gone to Liverpool.

The Colmans: Jeremiah James (1830–1898), Helen Caroline (1865–1947) & Ethel Mary (1863–1948)

The Colman donation came to Norwich Castle Museum in 1921 and now constitutes just over half of the current (i.e., post-Liverpool) collection. It was acquired by Jeremiah James Colman when in Egypt between November 1896 and February 1897 in order to be with his ailing son, Alan (fig 7). Jeremiah, along with Alan and other members of the Colman family, travelled up the Nile in one of Thomas Cook’s dahabeahs, the Hathor. They sailed from Cairo to Luxor and it was there that Colman bought most of his collection of around 250 antiquities.⁸⁶ In this he was advised by Dr Worthington, Alan’s personal physician who had accompanied him to Egypt. Worthington was not an expert but he clearly ‘knew the ropes’ as far as purchasing antiquities was concerned because he had on several previous occasions similarly travelled as physician with others who had visited Egypt for health reasons. He had on at least one occasion accompanied another Norfolk family, the Birkbecks (see below). Consequently he had some knowledge of the dealers, especially at Luxor, which was the popular destination for travellers during the 1890s. He himself is known to have bought at least a few items.⁸⁷ He directed Colman to Mohammed Mohassib, one of the leading and most highly-regarded local dealers of his day who supplied private individuals as well as museums across the world. Jeremiah is known to have bought at least one item from him, the exceptional model granary (cat no 371). But in all likelihood, many more items must have been purchased from this dealer. The Colmans were only in Luxor for a few days and to have acquired over 250 objects within that short space of time through a series of single, isolated, purchases does not seem probable. It is much more likely that Mohassib sold Jeremiah a ‘job lot’ of antiquities.

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7 The Colmans in Egypt. Jeremiah with two of his daughters and their dragomen sightseeing at the Ramesseum. The Colmans purchased over 250 antiquities while in Egypt. © Norfolk Museums Service

Also mentioned in connection with Colman’s Luxor purchases is Abdul Mejdid, brother-in-law of Mohassib. Medjid’s reputation was not as exulted as Mohassib’s; he was described as ‘a thorough scamp’ by the Egyptologist, James Edward Quibell.⁸⁸ From Medjid, Colman is known to have bought a pair of tweezers (cat no 311). But, again, it is unlikely that this is all that was purchased from him. Apart from the Luxor purchases, a few had been made in Cairo before the Colmans set off up the Nile heading towards Luxor. There is mention of a necklace (cat no 232) having been bought from a dealer named Hamed, whose shop was situated close to the Colmans’ hotel, the well-known Mena House.⁸⁹

Back in Norwich, the antiquities were arranged in a specially-built oak display case at the Colmans’ home, Carrow House. On Jeremiah’s death, two of his daughters, Ethel and Helen, inherited the collection. Keen not to neglect it, they invited the Egyptologist, James Edward Quibell, to Norwich in order to view and document it. He itemised it in a leather-bound and handwritten manuscript titled Curios from Egypt.⁹⁰ It was also viewed by Blackman, who published an article on the model granary (cat no 371).

Ethel and Helen became members of the local Egyptian Society of East Anglia and on one occasion invited the group to Carrow House to view their collection; during that visit, the Society’s honorary secretary, Alice Geldart, gave an introductory talk. Petrie also appears to have seen the collection, though details of his visit are not known.⁹¹ It is clear from all of this activity that the Colman sisters were excellent custodians of their antiquities. Their enthusiasm was also reflected in the fact that one of them, Helen, was a subscriber to the Egypt Exploration Society during the first part of the 20th century. The Colman sisters finally offered their material to the City of Norwich for the benefit of all its citizens and it, together with the oak display case which had been specially made to house it, came to the museum in 1921.⁹²

Unlike Spurrell’s material, the Colman donation is less well provenanced; of over 250 items only 50 or so are with known findspot. In Quibell’s manuscript, Curios from Egypt, when provenances are mentioned it is often possible to determine the source of that information. In a few instances these may have come from the dealers themselves. Most notable in this regard is that relating to the model granary bought from Mohammed Mohassib. As a respected dealer, Mohassib may well have had credible information supplied to him about the origins of at least some of his ‘shop stock’, especially if it were exceptional or rare, as was the Norwich granary, recorded as having come from Salamiya. That this information is likely to be accurate is supported by current research (see Chapter 4).

Another source of information was naturally Quibell himself. His knowledge of all that was happening in Egyptology at the time was comprehensive: he lived in Egypt; he knew all of the major Egyptologists of his day such as Sir Flinders Petrie and Jacques-Jean Marie de Morgan; and he himself was actively involved in excavating sites. This familiarity enabled him to make comments such as the following: regarding a pair of model sandals he wrote – ‘Exactly similar ones were found last year in the Vth Dyn tombs at Deshasheh’ (see cat no 370); and concerning a stone fish, his upto-date knowledge allowed him to write – ‘... fish of this shape and size were found in March 1897 by M. [Jacques] de Morgan’ (see cat no 133). So, he was well placed to provide relevant information about provenance.

The information which the Colmans themselves provided was limited to naming the places where their purchases had been made such as ‘bought at Luxor’ or ‘bought at Mena House from Hamed’ (see cat no 232). Since then, a few more findspots have been identified, the most significant being that of a rare early 18th Dynasty shroud belonging to Ipu which until its conservation in 2011, had no known provenance but which can now be assigned to the Royal Cache (see Chapter 3 for details). In addition, a few provenances have been changed in the present volume based on current knowledge, as for example, an ushebti of Pinudjem II, for which evidence now exists to suggest that it also came from the Royal Cache and not from the second Cache at Bab el-Gasus (see cat no 15 for details).

The Colman donation has the distinction of being the only one of all of the major Egyptian donations not to have been dispersed. It has been retained in Norwich in its entirety – all, that is, except for two papyri inscribed with texts from the Book of the Dead.⁹³

Sir Rider Haggard (1856–1925)

Sir Rider Haggard was another Norfolk man who donated some of his collection to Norwich. Best known as a novelist, Haggard was also an Egyptophile who made several visits to Egypt – the first in 1887 and his fourth, and last, in 1924, a year before his death. He had become fascinated with that country and wrote many articles bringing a range of issues to the attention of the general public and so helping to foster debate. One such concerned the ethics of displaying mummies in museums – a topic which continues to be debated today. Haggard wrote in emotive terms of royal mummies left ‘to rot in a glass case’ where they were ‘made the butt of the merry jests of tourists’.⁹⁴ He advocated a radical, if rather bizarre, solution, namely, that they should first be modelled in wax and then buried in the chambers of the Great Pyramid which should be pumped with cement, thus sealing them for ever.⁹⁵

As one interested in ancient Egypt, Haggard, like the Colmans, was a member of the Egypt Exploration Society (from the 1890s until his death) as well as of the local Egyptian Society of East Anglia (ESEA). He regularly attended ESEA’s meetings and was for a time one of its vice-presidents; and, like the Colman sisters, he once invited the local Society to his home, Ditchingham House, to view his antiquities. During his lifetime, Haggard’s material was viewed by Blackman, who published an article on several pieces within the writer’s collection.⁹⁶

Today, the single item in Norwich most associated with him is not an antiquity but a modern-day sherd, made as part of the narrative of his novel, She. Haggard’s fame rested much more on his novels than on his love of Egypt, and he was, and remains, most associated with the so-called lost-world genre. This genre, often imbued with Imperialist overtones, displayed a fascination for ‘lost’ civilisations, like Egypt, whose ancient culture was being unearthed during the 19th and early 20th centuries through archaeological excavations.⁹⁷ The sherd of Amenartas (cat no 443) together with a scarab ring (cat no 444), both relating to She, were donated to the museum in 1917, thirty years after the novel’s publication. Both of these objects went to Liverpool but were later returned since they were not regarded as genuine antiquities.⁹⁸ The remainder of the collection came to the Norwich museum after his death in 1925.

Haggard’s antiquities had been purchased by him over the course of several years, i.e., during his four visits to Egypt. Like the Colman collection, his too was bought from dealers and most lacks provenance. Only part of it (just under 150 objects) was given to Norwich; some was also donated to the British Museum. Of the Norwich items, fewer than 20 now remain, the rest having been sold to Liverpool.

Susan Birkbeck (1833–1927)

Several Birkbecks were known in Norfolk in the 19th century; the ones who visited Egypt were William (1832–1897) and his wife, Susan. William was a wealthy banker and landowner and Susan was his second wife. The family is mentioned in the letters of Charles Edwin Wilbour, the American traveller and businessman, who regularly visited Egypt.⁹⁹ Like Wilbour, William Birkbeck suffered from poor health and made periodic trips to Egypt throughout the 1880s-90s (and possibly even earlier).¹⁰⁰ Birkbeck travelled together with his wife and daughter and on several occasions was accompanied by Dr Worthington, the same physician as travelled with Alan Colman (see above). The Birkbecks and Colmans were Norwich- based Norfolk families who knew each other and mixed in the same social circles so it is not surprising that they also shared a physician.

Like the Colmans and so many well-to-do travellers of the 19th century, the Birkbecks bought antiquities during their numerous trips to Egypt. Over the years they acquired in excess of a hundred pieces, which Susan inherited after her husband’s death in 1897. She retained these for many years until in 1914 she decided to donate them to the Norwich Museum. Little is known about Susan but Egypt must have captured her imagination because she became a member of the local Egyptian Society of East Anglia, regularly attending its meetings and participating in its events.

Of the one hundred or so items which were purchased, Norwich now holds seven, the remainder having been sold to Liverpool. The Norwich collection includes four, possibly five, silver amulets, items which would have been prized above gold in ancient Egyptian times (see cat nos 73–77). The Birkbeck collection came to the museum with only scant details of how the family had acquired it while in Egypt – no dealers are named and as far as sites or provenances are concerned, only vague, and ultimately uninformative, references are given – ‘obtained about 1850’; or ‘[from] Banks of Nile, 1870’; or ‘obtained about 1880 from natives on the banks of the Nile’.¹⁰¹ What is notable however, if the dates are to be believed, is the extended period during which the Birkbecks travelled to Egypt. This is in keeping with the experiences of other 19th century travellers visiting Egypt for chronic health reasons and who did so over many years.¹⁰²

Greville John Chester (1830–1892)

The Rev. Greville John Chester was born in Denton, Norfolk. As a youth, before going up to Oxford, his interest in archaeology was already evident. He became a member of the Archaeological Institute and would from time to time send it information concerning local archaeological finds.¹⁰³ Later, he was ordained as a priest and practised for a time, but he was more intent on pursuing his wide archaeological interests.¹⁰⁴ From the late 1860s his poor health caused him to winter in warmer lands. Like William Birkbeck (see above) he travelled frequently to Egypt, but unlike Birkbeck, Chester had a passion for archaeology as well as some knowledge of ancient Egyptian material culture. He became an inveterate collector whose antiquities found their way into many British museums, most notable among them, the Ashmolean in Oxford, which received thousands of his objects. His knowledge, combined with his prolific collecting, helped him develop a very good eye and he was much respected and trusted in the museum world.¹⁰⁵

He generally collected small finds as these were easier to transport than large, bulky pieces, and the antiquities he gave to Norwich certainly belong to the former group. Chester made two separate donations. In 1864 he gave an assortment of objects which included a wooden head from a coffin (cat no 360), some animal mummies and a range of Egyptian beads;¹⁰⁶ then in 1872 he gave a number of rosettes, inlays for the walls of a royal palace (see cat no 382). These securely provenanced inlays from Tell el-Yahudiya, a site he had visited, are perhaps amongst his most notable acquisitions. Today, of the 50-odd antiquities he gave to Norwich, only six remain, the rest having been sold to Liverpool.

J.H.T. Dawson (1887–1955(?)

J.H.T. Dawson is a man about whom only a little is known.¹⁰⁷ A brief newspaper article written in 1940, the year he donated antiquities to Norwich Castle Museum, describes how his collection had been formed. He had lived in the vicinity of Luxor for about five years at around 1910. Although interested in collecting, he himself admitted that he was ‘un simple collectionneur et non un savant’.¹⁰⁸ The local fellaheen were always keen to bring him small items such as scarabs and the like, which he would readily buy for only a few piastres. He supplemented this source by picking through excavated rubble and generally fossicking at the edge of the desert. Occasionally he would also buy items from local shops which sold curios. Altogether, he seems to have amassed a collection of around a hundred pieces and he donated about 40 of these to Norwich. Today, Norwich retains three of them (cat nos 321–323).

Other Donors

The remaining individuals are minor in terms of the size of their donations. The best known is King George V, who in 1928 gave the coffin lid and cartonnage of Ankh-hor (cat nos 355 & 356), as well as the two glass cases in which they were displayed. Mummy and lid had stood upright in one of the rooms at Sandringham, the royal estate in Norfolk (see fig 8). On the wall above the mummy cases, which were placed on either side of a fireplace, hung three trophy animal heads; and spread out on the floor below was a tiger skin – in all, the room exuded an air of Empire and of foreign travel.

Most of the other donors are notable for their virtual invisibility. Often, little more than their names are known. Occasionally, some information surfaces, as in the case of a Mr Blair, who donated two shabtis (cat nos 9 & 10) apparently ‘purchased from a museum in Cairo between 1946 and 1948 ...[and] brought to England in 1952’.¹⁰⁹ This sheds light on a well-known practice during the late 19th century and into the 1960s, namely, the sale of antiquities by the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.¹¹⁰

There is also a handful of individuals whose collections were later sold in their entirety to Liverpool. Most notable amongst these are the collections of Robert Grenville Gayer-Anderson (1881–1945) and of Sir J. and Lady Currie. Gayer-Anderson was a wellknown collector who was an army doctor stationed in Egypt, a country which he made his home for many years. He was an avid and discerning collector who acquired a large number of antiquities, many of which he gave to the Fitzwilliam Museum.¹¹¹ It appears he also gave a few items to Norwich. One museum record mentions a group of 39 objects presented to Norwich Castle Museum in 1944; these were apparently duplicates from his collection.¹¹² None are now held at the Norwich Museum but at least some of this material can be traced to Liverpool.¹¹³

The other collectors, Sir J. and Lady Currie, are far more elusive and their Norfolk connection, if indeed they had one, is difficult to trace. According to museum records their donation found its way into the museum in 1941 via two other individuals, perhaps acting as agents for the Curries’ deceased estate.¹¹⁴ As to the size of the Currie collection, the museum’s Accession Register does not give details, but since it, like the Colman donation, came in its own display case, it was obviously sizeable, a fact confirmed in later documentation, which shows that it was in excess of 170 objects.¹¹⁵ None of these items is now held in Norwich.

Henrietta Gurney and Samuel Woodward are two further benefactors whose donations are no longer in Norwich. Gurney was a member of a well-known Quaker family which had originally come to Norwich in the 17th century. The family prospered and during the latter part of the 18th century, they established Gurney’s Bank in the City of Norwich. The other donor, Samuel Woodward, had been born in Norwich. He was a geologist and antiquarian who had published works in both of those fields. In the mid-1820s, his diverse interests naturally drew him to the newly-established museum in the Haymarket and for many years he was an active member of the museum committee.

Woodward and Gurney both donated antiquities which are of interest because of their acquisition history. They were said to have come from Giovanni Battista Belzoni, the great traveller in Egypt, perhaps best known for his discovery of Seti I’s tomb in 1817. Belzoni moved, and excavated, extensively throughout Egypt and brought many antiquities (large and small) to England, the most famous being the colossal bust of Rameses II, also known as the Young Memnon and now in the British Museum.

The exact circumstances of how the antiquities relating to Belzoni were acquired by Gurney and Woodward are not known. Museum records merely state that he was the source, though whether directly or indirectly is not clear. In the case of Henrietta Gurney, she gave three items in 1828 said to be connected with Belzoni and with Seti I’s tomb; these included a wooden figure, a mummified cat, and a seal.¹¹⁶ As for Woodward’s antiquities related to Belzoni’s travels, they included a scarab, a mummified fish and crocodile, and fragments of mummy wrappings. These are now in Liverpool.¹¹⁷

CONCLUSION

In many ways the history of the Norwich Egyptian collection echoes that of other collections in English provincial museums established during the 19th century: in particular, it was formed at a time when many museums had no firm collecting policy and so amassed diverse collections; also, these were (very largely) acquired through benevolent private donors willing and keen to place their antiquities into public museums. Two inevitable outcomes of this lack of a collecting policy was, first, a proliferation of the collections and, second, a duplication of artefacts and/ or gaps within the collection. For some museums, like Norwich, this led