The British Museum Tour

The tour will begin in Lord Foster's Great Hall. Here you will see ancient scripts on the Rosetta Stone from Egypt, architectural relics from temples and mausoleums in Mesopotamia, Assyria, Greece etc., the huge statues of Pharaoh Rameses the Great, many pieces of the friezes showing the pan-Athenic festival of the ruins of the Parthenon at the Acropolis in Greece and a special hall was constructed so they could be on permanent display to all. The Enlightenment Gallery shows collections of souvenirs brought back from journeys to foreign lands by wealthy people who wanted to share them with others. You will learn how the dead were preserved either intentionally, such as the Egyptian Mummies, or "Ginger"- or incidentally such as the English bog-man. In England, many people hid their valuables, art and jeweller, underground when in fear of invasion or attack. In the British Galleries, you will see ancient Jewellery, weapons, armouries, plates, cutlery - even Roman postcards! Items were imported, brought by immigrants or produced in Britain, giving us an insight into earlier cultures and civilisations of our predecessors of Celtic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Viking or Norman origin, as well as more recent world-wide migrants from which today's multi-cultural nation derived. Harry Potter fans will love the Lewis chess set found on the Scottish island. There is so much more to see, such as the Islamic gallery (currently under construction), European and Chinese porcelain, clocks, medicine or money from around the world but not enough time in this tour.