From Egypt’s Sands to Northern Hills:

A project funded by Renaissance North West is currently underway by postgraduate students from the University of Liverpool who have been given the task of reconciling and researching the material from the Egyptian excavations of John Garstang in their local museums – Kendal, Blackburn and Towneley Hall, Burnley – with the records and photographs housed at the Garstang Museum, University of Liverpool.

John Garstang, born in Blackburn in 1876, was the founder of the Liverpool Institute of Archaeology, now the School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool. Garstang excavated several sites, mostly cemeteries, in Egypt between 1902 and World War One. For each excavation a financing committee was set up and 50% of the objects were divided between the Liverpool Institute and the sponsors of these excavations.

One of these sponsors, and also the Treasurer of the Excavation Committee, was John Rankin of Hill Top, Kendal, who donated his Egyptian collection to Kendal Museum in January 1923. John Rankin’s Egyptian collection was of an exceptionally high quality, and includes objects from historically significant tombs. Several of the objects have already been published and are famous in their own right.

Anna Garnett, a postgraduate research student in Egyptology at the University of Liverpool, has been piecing together the history behind the Egyptian objects in Kendal Museum for the last eight months. She is a former pupil of Ghyllside School and Queen Katherine School, Kendal, and has been studying Egyptology at Liverpool University since 2004. Anna undertook her year 10 work experience here at Kendal Museum where she had her first museum experience and helped re-display the Egyptian collection, the very material she is now working on as a PhD student.

There are over 140 Egyptian objects in Kendal Museum, which range from painted and inscribed hieroglyphic inscriptions to mummified animals. Anna has already successfully traced many of these objects to the excavations of John Garstang at the turn of the last century, through a detailed investigation of excavation photographs, notebooks, letters and the analysis of Garstang's pencil markings on some of the objects.

The major result of this project will be an exhibition of objects from these collections which will tour the four museums. Kendal Museum will be the first to host this exhibition, from 1 April to 30 September 2011. The project will also produce a loan box for schools and educational activities.

The education project will be focusing on Ancient Egyptian writing and how it is deciphered, religious beliefs, rites and moral behaviour.

See the Schools section for more ideas, activities and services provided by Kendal Museum.

Unfortunately the temporary exhibition area and the Lake District Natural History Gallery are not accessible to wheelchair users.

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