Countdown to Harrogate

The blog post for this week has been written by Egypt Centre volunteer and University of Birmingham student, Sam Powell, whose visit to Harrogate Museum in July 2022 led to the loan of the collection to the Egypt Centre.

As you may already be aware from social media posts and a series of YouTube videos, earlier this year, over 800 objects arrived in Swansea on loan from Harrogate in order to allow for in-depth recording and research to be undertaken. A condition of this loan was that the objects would be available via an online catalogue for researchers and the public alike, and so, as part of the Egypt Centre’s twenty-five year anniversary celebrations due to take place in October this year, the Harrogate Egyptian Collection will be launched hosted by Abaset Collections (fig. 1)!

Fig. 1: Forty days to go!

As part of my PhD research visits in 2022, I visited the Mercer Art Gallery in Harrogate to examine a wooden funerary figure in their collection (fig. 2). During my visit, staff mentioned that they would like to utilise their ancient Egyptian collection more effectively, and reach a wider audience. Of course, my first thought was to recommend the Egypt Centre as the ideal place for the objects to undergo full cataloguing and research given the fantastic experience I had working with the collection in Swansea, both as a volunteer, student, and also in creating the Egypt Centre Online Collection (Abaset) for them.

Fig. 2: Catalogue entry for the female figure

Abaset Collections came about as a result of my frustrations as a user of online catalogues for my own research, and so I worked closely with the Egypt Centre team to create a bespoke application that focuses on the user experience and engagement with the objects. The Egypt Centre Online Collection launched in October 2020, and was very timely given the temporary closure of the museum to the public due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. The Online Collection has proven a valuable asset for the museum, with easy access via mobile devices, high-quality photography of the objects, 3D models, and easy-to-search data to explore. Trails in a variety of languages including English, Welsh, Arabic, Spanish, and Hungarian allow for different themes and topics to be tailored for different audiences. These elements will also be available for the Harrogate Egyptian Online Collection.

All 813 objects from Harrogate have already been photographed from several angles (almost 4000 photos), and the Egypt Centre team and Swansea University students, along with several specialists in different object types, have been working tirelessly to hunt down provenances of objects, translate the names of the deceased, trace auction details, and categorise pottery types in order to populate the data within the online catalogue. This is still very much a work in progress, so not all the objects will be fully catalogued at the time of the launch (fig. 3). One of the best things about Abaset (in my opinion!) is the ability to update information in real-time. This means as soon we know something new about an object, it’s instantly available to everyone!

Fig. 3: Stelae in the Harrogate collection

We really hope you enjoy exploring the absolutely incredible collection of objects that make up the Harrogate Egyptian collection; it’s been so exciting sharing in the discoveries surrounding the objects (with many more to come, I’m sure!). The Harrogate Egyptian Online Collection will be launched on 7^th October, so keep your eyes peeled on the day for the link to the site, and please do share any feedback you have about the software and the objects themselves!

Registration for the Egypt Centre’s anniversary celebrations (which will include both the launch of this new online collection, and a presentation about the Egypt Centre Online Collection) is available here.

For a brief preview of the Harrogate Egyptian Collection, see the newly released video below, the fourth in the series on the Harrogate collection.