Egypt’s scattered heritage: The distribution of Egyptian archaeology to the world’s museums

Egypt’s cultural heritage is one of the most widely dispersed of any country, following centuries of intense colonial and imperial interest in its history, monuments and antiquities. From 1883 onwards, British teams were prolific exporters of Egyptian antiquities and it is estimated that some 350 institutions across 27 countries in 5 continents received Egyptian archaeological finds through British agencies. Previous research on these distributions has tended to focus on the artefacts themselves as sources of information about the ancient past, but these Egyptian artefacts represent far more than just themselves. This talk examines the motivations for collecting Egyptian antiquities from 1883 to the present day in a diversity of contexts.

Alice Stevenson is a Senior Lecturer in Museum Studies at University College London's Institute of Archaeology. She has previously held posts as the Curator of the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, UCL (2012-2016) and as a Researcher in World Archaeology at the University of Oxford's Pitt Rivers Museum (2009-2012). She has written extensively on topics in prehistoric archaeology and Egyptology, as well as on the history of collections and museums. She is currently leading the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) project ‘Artefacts of Excavation’ which is examining the history, politics and legacy of exported archaeological finds from British excavations in Egypt to museums worldwide.