Museum news

This article is from Current Archaeology issue 421

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Ancient Egyptian bread found in museum store

A crumb of c.3,000-year-old bread, originally recovered from an ancient Egyptian tomb in Thebes, has been identified during work to document a collection of previously uncatalogued slides at the Leeds Discovery Centre.

Stored in small wooden trays, the thousands-strong collection is being reviewed by volunteer Stephen Crabtree, who initially began working with the museum to study fossilised plants. Other highlights among his recent discoveries include a speck of dust from the infamous eruption of Krakatoa in 1883, which landed on the deck of a ship sailing 1,000 miles west of the volcanic island; a fully miniaturised late Victorian edition of The Times; and important deep-sea samples gathered during HMS Challenger’s circumnavigation of the globe in 1872.

Once the collection has been fully photographed, it is hoped the slides will be added to a national database accessible to researchers and the public.

The Leeds Discovery Centre is open to the public for free, pre-booked visits; for more information, see https://museumsandgalleries.leeds.gov.uk/leeds-discovery-centre.

Immersive Tutankhamun exhibition to open in London

A major new exhibition, combining cutting-edge technology with ancient Egyptian history, is set to open in London later this month.

Spanning six gallery spaces, Tutankhamun: the immersive exhibition has been created in collaboration with Egyptologists and historians, and is endorsed and supported by the Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo. It features 8m- high, 360° projections; virtual reality experiences; a film recounting the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb; and a hologram presentation revealing the processes by which the boy-king was mummified; as well as displays of authentic artefacts and replica items.

The experience will run at Immerse LDN on the ExCeL Waterfront from 28 March until 29 June, before leaving the UK on a wider European tour.

Adult tickets cost from £20, children’s tickets from £15.50; schools can apply for a special group booking rate by emailing exhibition@fkpscorpio.co.uk. For more information, see http://www.tutankhamunexperience.com/london.

Scenting the past at Nothe Fort

Nothe Fort in Weymouth has been exploring how historically inspired smells can help to illuminate the experiences of the soldiers who once manned its Victorian coastal defences.

Evocative odours produced by AromaPrime (who have been creating scents for museum exhibits and heritage attractions since the 1970s; see CA 399) will be demonstrated in a special event at the fort on 8-9 March; after this, the bespoke formulae will be available to the fort team to use in future exhibitions and events.

The recreations draw on a wealth of contemporary resources including cooking instructions, records of sanitary conditions, a medical manual, and newspaper archives, as well as features of the fort itself. They include smells reflecting the soldiers’ crowded living quarters (as well as the cleanliness of the men’s uniforms and their pub-going habits); their diet, which was dominated by boiled meat and potatoes; coal-fire smoke; and more pungent odours relating to sanitation.

See http://www.nothefort.org.uk for more information about visiting Nothe Fort; to read more about AromaPrime, see http://www.aromaprime.com.

New exhibitions

Life at an Iron Age Hillfort: investigating Breedon Hill & Burrough Hill
University of Nottingham Museum
Until 13 July 2025
http://www.lakesidearts.org.uk/whats-on

Secrets of the Thames: mudlarking London’s lost treasures
London Museum Docklands
4 Apr 2025–1 Mar 2026
http://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/whats-on