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Tuesday, July 30, 2019

British Museum - Home of the Rosetta Stone

Rosetta Stone - about 4' by 3' by 1'
The Rosetta Stone is probably the world's most famous piece of granodiorite - a type of granite. The type of rock is common - but the writing on it made it famous. The rock was a street sign - with a decree of law on it from the government of Ptolemy around 196 BC. It is written in 3 languages. First in hierogyphics (picture letters) - second in Egyptian text - and finally in Ancient Greek. It was done that way so many people would understand what the sign said. 

In 1799 - the French under Napoleon found it in Rosetta - Egypt. They immediately realized its value for translation. In 1802 - the British overrun Egypt - and took the stone to England to protect it. It has been housed in the British Museum ever since. Of course Egypt would like it back.

On the first time we went to London in 1996 - it was unprotected in the museum - you could walk up and touch it. Now it is in a protective glass case - easy for getting close to read - and making it the most visited item in the museum.



The British Museum is our London neighbor. It was started in 1752 and was the first - largest - free - public museum in the world. It is just around the corner from our London home. Tuesday morning it was raining and Lulu was taking her class to the Facebook Headquarters. It was maid day at the apartment - so I went to the museum - to get out of the way. 

There are 13 million objects at the museum.





There are hundreds of antiquities taken from Egypt when that country was under the British Crown.





This was a carving from an Assyrian Palace.


 This haunting beautiful statue raises my camera every time.

I love the simplicity of the Parthenon in Athens.

When we built our house we had the Parthenon in mind.

It is simple in an OCD person's mind

The museum room where they house Parthenon parts

Ruins stolen from Greece and Rome

This is the missing Caryatid from the Acropolis.

The basement houses the Africa antiquities



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