#49 Addendum, Only for the the geeks who really love museums

 

The Holy Thorn Reliquary

Lavishly decorated with jewels and originating in France around 1400, this reliquary contains a single thorn purported to be taken from the biblical crown of thorns. It's one of a small number of goldsmiths' works surviving from the courts of the Valois royal family of medieval France.

Assyrian lion hunt reliefs

Originating from the ancient Mesopotamian city of Nineveh, near modern-day Mosul in Iraq, these reliefs were carved during the reign of Ashurbanipal – the last great Assyrian king – and rank among the finest known achievements of Assyrian art.

Bust of Ramesses the Great

This section of a larger statue, which weighs 7.5 tonnes, once sat in the Ramesseum, in Egypt, venerating Ramesses II, one of the greatest Egyptian pharaohs. Coverage of the bust's transportation to the UK is believed to have inspired Shelley's famous sonnet, Ozymandias.

The Ife Head

A brass casting, maybe 600 years old, probably depicting Ooni, the leader of the West African Kingdom of Ife. Lifelike depictions of people such as those from Ife are unique in African art of the period and reflect important aspects of this landmark culture that existed by the lower Niger River.

Oxus treasure

Stunning examples of gold and silver metalwork found in the Oxus river, on the border of Afghanistan and Tajikistan, which date back to the Achaemenid Empire of the 5th to 3rd century BC. Together, the pieces form one of the British Museum's great collections.

Mold ceremonial gold cape

At the centre of a stone-lined grave, found in Mold in North Wales in 1833, was a crushed gold cape around the fragmentary remains of a skeleton. Strips of bronze and numbers of amber beads were recovered, but only one of the beads reached the British Museum.

This cape is one of the finest examples of prehistoric sheet-gold working and is quite unique in form and design. The cape was restored at the British Museum during the 1960s. Before that, no one really knew its exact original shape. It dates back to the European Bronze Age.

 

Basse Yutz flagons

These ceremonial drinking vessels were discovered in France and produced in the 5th century BC. Once considered too sophisticated to be genuine, their manufacture points to trading links between distant areas of Europe and cultural links with Egypt.

The Hinton St Mary Mosaic

Discovered in Dorset in 1963 and originally part of a Roman-period mosaic floor, the Hinton St. Mary Mosaic is believed to show an image of Jesus Christ. If so, it would be one of the earliest surviving depictions, dating back to the 4th century.

The Sutton Hoo ship burial

Found undisturbed in 1939, the many artefacts of the Sutton Hoo burial date back to 7th century Britain and are popularly believed to have belonged to an Anglo-Saxon king. See one of the most magnificent archaeological discoveries ever made in the UK for yourself.

Lewis Chessmen

Fashioned from walrus ivory and brimming with personality, the Lewis Chessmen were made in the 12th century and discovered buried in a sand bank off the Scottish island of Lewis in 1831. They have been described as the most famous chess pieces in the world.

Mechanical galleon

Constructed in around 1585 in southern Germany, this elaborately but precisely designed nef (a type of table ornament) is made of gilded brass. When it worked, it would have displayed a range of automated movements – rolling forward on its wheels, emitting smoke from the cannons, and playing music – as well as functioning as a clock.

Royal Game of Ur

Originally played in the early third millennium BC and once popular across the Middle East, the rules of this two-player strategy boardgame were lost to history until British Museum curator Irving Finkel decoded a cuneiform tablet containing the instructions in the early 1980s.

The Flood Tablet

The Assyrian King Ashurbanipal (reigned 669–631BC) collected a library of thousands of cuneiform tablets in his palace at Nineveh. The best known of these was the story of Gilgamesh, a legendary ruler of Uruk, and his search for immortality. The Epic of Gilgamesh is a huge work, the longest piece of literature in Akkadian (the language of Babylonia and Assyria). This, the 11th tablet of the Epic, describes the meeting of Gilgamesh with Utnapishtim. Like Noah in the Hebrew Bible, Utnapishtim had been forewarned of a plan by the gods to send a great flood. He built a boat and loaded it with all his precious possessions, his kith and kin, domesticated and wild animals and skilled craftsmen of every kind.

Sphinx of Taharqo

This statue was found in Temple T at Kawa, in Upper Nubia (Sudan). Sphinxes are associated with the sun god and are a symbol of the immense power of the Egyptian king. The human head of this sphinx is adorned with two uraei, the symbols of kingship. The face is that of Taharqo, whose name appears in the cartouche on the chest. Taharqo was one of the kings of Kush who conquered and then ruled Egypt as the 25th Dynasty (about 747–656 BC). 

Mummy of Katebet 

One of the most-studied mummies in the Museum, Katebet was a Chantress of Amun, and would have sung and performed music during rituals. Both the mummy and her accoutrements are incredibly well preserved, despite dating back to 1300 BC.

Samurai armour

Armour and weaponry defined the samurai's authority on the battlefield. This complete, matching set of armour was produced for a member of the powerful Mori family, who were samurai lords based in western Japan.

And the rest I just liked

Warned ya!!!