Department of Greece and Rome
Contact details
Email: [email protected]
Phone: +44 (0)20 7323 8321
Department of Greece and Rome
The British Museum
Great Russell Street
London
WC1B 3DG
The Department of Greece and Rome cares for one of the most important collections in the world from the ancient Mediterranean.
Spanning from about 5000 BC to the 4th century AD, the department embraces:
- Collections from the era of the Grand Tour, including the Greek vase collection of Sir William Hamilton, the marble sculptures of Charles Townley and a substantial number of prints and drawings.
- Architecture, sculpture and other material from Museum-sponsored excavations such as at Halikarnassos, Knidos, Ephesos, Cyrene and Carthage.
- A huge variety of smaller items, including bronzes, terracottas, gems, glass and jewellery.
The collection derives from numerous ancient Mediterranean cultures. It includes the major monuments of ancient Caria and Lycia, one of the most important collections of Etruscan and Italic artefacts outside of Italy, as well as rich holdings from Greece, Cyprus, the Black Sea, Egypt and North Africa. The collection also spans the Roman empire (except Britain, which is looked after by the Department of Britain, Europe and Prehistory).
Accessing the collection
Object identification
Staff
- Sadie Brown – Assistant Collection Manager
- Ollie Croker – Alejandro Santo Domingo Project Curator: Recovery and Documentation
- Victoria Donnellan – Curator: Reception of the Ancient Mediterranean
- Celeste Farge – Assistant Collection Manager
- Genevieve Fisher – Project Curator: Reception of the Ancient Mediterranean
- Alice Foreman – Project Manager: Recovery and Documentation
- Thomas Harrison – Keeper of Greece and Rome
- James Jones – Assistant Collection Manager
- Allison Kidd – Curator: Ancient Anatolia and the Eastern Mediterranean
- Thomas Kiely – A.G. Leventis Curator: Ancient Cyprus and the Aegean Bronze Age
- Jackie Lau – Assistant Collection Manager
- Isobel MacDonald – Project Curator: Recovery and Documentation
- Aurélia Masson-Berghoff – Curator, Late Period, Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt (Egypt and Sudan); Curator, Recovery Project
- Christian Mazet – Curator: Cultures of Italy and the Western Mediterranean
- Kate Morton – Illustrator
- Thorsten Opper – Curator: Roman Collections
- David Saunders – Curator: Greek World
- Charlie Stanley – Imaging Assistant
- Nikiforos Tounousidis – Project Curator: Western Range
- Alex Truscott – Collection Manager
- Alexandra Villing – Curator: Greek Collections
- Claudia Wagner – Senior Research Associate: Classical Gems
- Sophie Wardle – Project Curator: Recovery and Documentation
- Kate Whitehead – Project Curator: Sculpture Research and Documentation
- Anna Willi – Curator: Ancient Mediterranean Life
- Holly Winch – Project Curator: Hidden Stories of Childhood
The work of the department is supported by a team of administrative staff.
You can search for publications by specific staff members on the British Museum Research Repository.
Research
Research at the Museum drives the care, display and understanding of the collection. Our research creates new knowledge, often through collaboration and by using cutting edge technology. Research projects, studentships and other activities cover a wide variety of academic disciplines and can involve archaeological excavation, studies of museum collections, working with craftspeople, understanding our visitors, conservation and scientific investigations.
Research in the Department of Greece and Rome seeks to ask fundamental questions about the objects in our care and the societies that made and used them:
- How were these objects used and understood?
- How did they come into the collection?
- What can they tell us about:
- The everyday experience of ancient people
- The interactions between ancient societies
- How the lives of these people and their achievements have left a mark on those who came after them.
Staff work on a wide range of research projects with institutions worldwide – particularly in Greece, Türkiye, Cyprus, Italy and France. The department also plays a key role in academic training and postgraduate research, with several PhD students pursuing research projects in partnership with universities.
We aim to make the collections accessible and relevant to contemporary audiences and to enrich public and scholarly understanding through scientific research, joint fieldwork projects and partnerships with the countries from which the collections derive.
History of the collection
1753–1772
The British Museum was established with the celebrated collection of Sir Hans Sloane, including Greek and Roman objects. In 1772, the Museum purchased the collection of Sir William Hamilton, British Ambassador in Naples. His famous painted Greek ceramics inspired emerging classical archaeology and modern makers such as Josiah Wedgwood.
1800–1820s
The Museum purchased Grand Tour collections of Classical antiquities, including Charles Townley's. Lord Elgin's collection, including the Parthenon Sculptures, were purchased by the British Government for the Museum. The collection also grew through excavations, notably leading to the purchase of the sculptures from the Temple of Apollo at Bassai in 1815.
1830s–1845
Etruscan objects and Greek ceramics excavated at Vulci in central Italy by Lucien and Alexandrine Bonaparte were purchased by the Museum in the 1830s. Sculptural and architectural pieces from Sir Charles Fellows' exploration of Lycia in Türkiye (1838–44) transform the collection with the inclusion of funerary monuments from Xanthos.
1846–1860
In 1846, the Ottoman Sultan donated frieze slabs from the Mausoleum of Halikarnassos. Increased interest in Türkiye led to Charles Newton's excavations at Halikarnassos, Knidos and Didyma. The Museum supported subsequent excavations at Carthage and Kyrene in North Africa.
1860–1880s
The Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities was created. The Museum purchased the spectacular private collections of the Duc de Blacas and the Castellani family. Important sculpture and architecture from the Temple at Artemis in Ephesos (Türkiye) were donated to the Museum from 1868, following excavations by John and Henrietta Wood.
1880s–1890s
Objects donated to the Museum from Naukratis in Egypt, excavated by Flinders Petrie and others, illustrate life at this important trading centre. Major acquisitions from excavations in Cyprus helped advance Cypriot archaeology. Gregorios Antoniou, from Cyprus, worked as a foreman on many of these excavations – first in Cyprus and later in Crete, Greece, Türkiye and Syria – on behalf of the British Museum.
Early 1900s
The 20th century witnessed a shift towards cataloguing and publishing the collections. New acquisitions came from excavations in Crete, Greece and Türkiye conducted by the British School at Athens, and later from Leonard Woolley's work at Al Mina in Syria.
1930s–1940s
The collections were evacuated from Bloomsbury in September 1939 in anticipation of wartime bombing. The empty Greek and Roman Life Gallery was destroyed by an incendiary device on the night of 10–11 May 1941. The collections were redisplayed in groundbreaking modern form in the following decades.
1945
The Museum purchased the Portland Vase from William Cavendish-Bentick, the 7th Duke of Portland, descendant of the collector Margaret Cavendish Harley, who first lent the vase to the Museum in 1810.
1970s–1980s
Ancient Mediterranean objects were transferred to the department from the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Wellcome Collection. Philanthropic support helped modernise many of the Greek and Roman galleries.
1999–2019
The department conducted new fieldwork at Knidos, Naukratis and Tivoli. Acquisitions from this point on were fewer but well considered. They include 'Jennings Dog' (acquired in 2001 with support from the Heritage Lottery Fund, Art Fund and others) and the 'Hamilton Gray Vase' (purchased in 2007, and named after Lady Elizabeth Hamilton Gray, who promoted Etruscan studies in the mid-19th century).
2020s
Greater focus on public access in the 20th century results in large-scale temporary exhibitions, including: 'Troy: myth and reality'; 'Nero: the man behind the myth'; the international touring exhibition 'Ancient Greeks: athletes, warriors and heroes'; and the 'Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya Ancient World Project' funded by Getty's Sharing Collections in India initiative.
Recovery of missing items
On 16 August 2023, the Museum announced that a number of items of jewellery from the collection had been found to be stolen, missing or damaged, and that this was the subject of an ongoing investigation by the Metropolitan Police Service.
The Museum also spoke of its determination to recover the items. Find out more about the details of the losses, what we are doing to recover the items and what you can do to help.
