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Archive for August, 2017

Papyrus for the People Language Day

By tcrnlmb, on 30 August 2017

As part of the Papyrus for the People Project, we at the Petrie Museum hosted a day wherein specialists in Ancient Egyptian languages came in and looked at our collection.

The day started out with a team meeting; outlining the details of the project and the type of content we would like them to produce. See here for more information about the project itself.

Having got the admin out of the way, we proceeded to let the specialists have at it!

Language specialists looking into an open cupboard filled with papyri

If you stare too long into a papyrus cupboard, the papyrus cupboard stares back at you.

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Specimen of the Week 305: The Horned Screamer

By Nadine Gabriel, on 25 August 2017

Hello everyone, it’s Nadine Gabriel. I’ve been a familiar face at the Grant Museum over the years and I have recently started an internship here – I’m really looking forward to another year at the museum! Over the past few months, I’ve been accessioning objects in the display cabinets high up in the museum and I have come across many interesting specimens. However, one mounted skeleton with a striking pose really stood out to me and it’s also the only specimen of its species in the Grant Museum. Let’s make some noise for the horned screamer!

Articulated skeleton of a horned screamer (Anhima cornuta) LDUCZ-Y519

Articulated skeleton of a horned screamer (Anhima cornuta) LDUCZ-Y519

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Specimen of the Week 304: Fossil Box 12

By Tannis Davidson, on 11 August 2017

Fossil Box 12

Fossil Box 12

This week’s Specimen of the Week is, depending on how you count it, one single entity known as Fossil Box 12. It is also 89 individual specimens that have recently been transferred from UCL’s Geology collection. In total, 12 boxes containing 408 vertebrate fossils were transferred to the Grant Museum.

The new material is a welcome addition to the Museum’s fossil vertebrate reference collection and will be available for use in teaching and for research. Some of these specimens have already made their social media debuts such as Gideon Mantell’s Iguanodon bones and several fossil fish featuring on the Underwhelming Fossil Fish of the Month blog.

Fossil Box 12 was chosen as this week’s Specimen of the Week to celebrate the new fossils as well as all the work that has gone into documenting the new acquisitions.  (more…)

Specimen of the Week 303: the olm

By Will J Richard, on 4 August 2017

Hello! Will Richard here, finishing the week with another specimen. For this blog I’ve chosen an extraordinary little animal that you really can’t believe actually exists. But hey… that’s evolution. Readers… I give you the olm.

LDUCZ-W4 preserved olm

LDUCZ-W4 preserved olm

(more…)