British Museum

Charles Dickens was once a reader at the British Museum. The first public library in Britain was bound to attract important literary figures. It all started when physician and naturalist Sir Hans Sloane bequeathed his entire collection of over 71,000 items to the nation in 1753. Such a vast collection is bound to be diverse, but its chief focus was natural history specimens. Another early user of the reading room was Charles Darwin. Who knows how library access may have furthered along the revolutionary thinker who led to the greatest paradigm shift since Copernicus?

Flux is the prevailing condition of the structure of the British Museum. It used to be all encompassing, handling the materials that have now branched off into the Natural History Museum and the British Library. Its own libraries include the Paul Hamlyn Library, which is open to the public for on-site research, and a lending library for the staff, which is accessed by a book camouflaged door in the Enlightenment Gallery. The collection is made up materials relating to archaeology, museum studies, and the history of the museum.

Our tour guide, Charles Hoare, explained the many location changes the museum library has endured over time. In the 20 year tenure of his boss, the library has moved 14 times. This often occurs in order to make room for an exhibit. As we walked through the museum, Hoare would point to off to some gallery and tell us that the library used to be there. It had the feel of a Kids in the Hall skit. Upon reflection, I found it to be logical that the library would so often get the shift. It makes more sense for the staff library to be in a cramped "Long Room" than it does for the Enlightenment Gallery to be.

The tight space of the Long Room holds the library's most expensive collection: The Witt Collection. It is made up of books, Roman sculptures, Indian objects, and Middle Eastern objects. Books that jumped out at me were Lives of the Ancient Philosophers and India's Moor's Narratives.

Hoare quietly warned us against the massive consequences of a poorly thought out classification scheme. The museum originally classified things based on the departments. Classification needs an anchor and the departments are always shifting. They still have 25,000 items to redo.

The image above is the Gilgamesh Flood Tablet, something I wish I had thought to look for in person. When British Museum assistant George Smith discovered that this Assyrian tablet contained a flood story that predates the Old Testament, he apparently got so excited that he jumped around the room and undressed in front of his colleagues.

Fun Fact: James Murray applied for a job at the British Museum in his pre-OED days. He was rejected.

Image courtesy of the British Museum website.