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Rare items on display in Whitehaven and Edinburgh
Two museums – in Whitehaven and in Edinburgh – have recently announced the public display of rare new acquisitions.
At the Beacon Museum in Whitehaven, a gold arm-ring – dating to c.900-700 BC and found in West Cumbria by a local metal-detectorist – has gone on show until June 2024.
Image: Beacon Museum
Acquired through the Treasure Act 1996, the late Bronze Age artefact was jointly purchased with Tullie House Museum & Art Gallery in Carlisle, and from July 2024 it will be displayed at the latter site, before being exhibited on a rotational basis between the museums.
Similar arm-rings are known from other parts of the UK, but this is the first known example from West Cumbria, and only the ninth Bronze Age gold object recorded by the Portable Antiquities Scheme in the wider county. For more details, see http://www.thebeacon-whitehaven.co.uk.
Over at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, a 16th-century silver-gilt ewer and basin has gone on permanent display after having been accepted in lieu of inheritance tax by His Majesty’s Government from the collection of the Earls of Dalhousie.
Objects like these were prized possessions in elite households, used for ceremonially washing hands with rosewater at meals. Elizabeth I owned at least 40 such sets, but today they are exceptionally rare as many examples were later melted down. Fewer than a dozen sets made in London before 1600 are known to survive, among them the objects acquired by the National Museum of Scotland. Known as the Panmure ewer and basin – they were once owned by the Scottish Whig politician William Ramsay Maule, 1st Baron Panmure (1771-1852) – they were created in London in 1586 or 1587, with the maker’s mark ‘HC’ possibly indicating the Dutch goldsmith Harman Copleman.
Ceredigion Museum hopes to acquire hoard
The Friends of Ceredigion Museum in Aberystwyth hope that they, too, will be able in the future to display a new acquisition, having launched a fundraising campaign to keep a nationally significant hoard of Bronze Age metalwork in the county.
Containing more than 50 tools, weapons, and arm-rings, the 3,000-year-old collection was found by metal-detectorists in Llangeitho in 2020, and the find spot was investigated by Dyfed Archaeological Trust with funding from Cadw.
Bronze Age hoards are exceptionally rare in Ceredigion, where only two (vague) historical accounts of such finds are known. Now that this example has been declared Treasure, the Friends of Ceredigion Museum are striving to raise £4,200 to purchase the objects so that they can be displayed locally to where they were found. For more information about how to support the campaign, see http://www.friendsofceredigionmuseum.com.
Last chance to see
Drawn Together: how the museum’s collection inspires
Ceredigion Museum, Aberystwyth , Until 13 January
http://www.ceredigionmuseum.wales/collections-community/exhibitions
Gladiators: a day at the Roman Games
Colchester Castle, Until 14 January
http://www.colchester.cimuseums.org.uk/events/gladiators
Burma to Myanmar
British Museum, London, Until 11 February
http://www.britishmuseum.org/exhibitions/burma-myanmar
Black Atlantic: power, people, resistance
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Until 7 January
http://www.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/plan-your-visit/exhibitions/black-atlantic-power-people-resistance
All Mortal Greatness is but Disease
Scottish Maritime Museum, Dumbarton, Until 11 February
http://www.scottishmaritimemuseum.org/exhibitions/all-mortal-greatness-is-but-disease
The Art of Wessex
Salisbury Museum, Until 28 January
http://www.salisburymuseum.org.uk/whats-on/the-art-of-wessex
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