Canberra museum houses collection of hundreds of ancient objects

ABC NEWS (Australia)

There's a museum here in Canberra that's not on the tourist trail. The Australian National University's Classic Museum was started in 1962 as a way of giving students studying the classics, the chance to see and hold everyday objects from the ancient world. It now houses more than 600 artefacts including some with a controversial history.

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00:02It doesn't look like much from the outside.

00:04Some people can in fact complete an entire degree at ANU and not realise it's here.

00:09But being inside the ANU Classics Museum is like peering into cupboards of an ancient

00:13home – baby bottles, lamps, glassware and all the latest interior decor and kitchen

00:19gadgets.

00:20I do love a little sieve that could well have been used for making cheese.

00:27Without the funds to buy large antiquities, the museum began collecting objects that showcased

00:33the everyday lives of people living in ancient civilisations.

00:37This is how they would have hilled it and dipped it in.

00:41Somehow it makes it all very real.

00:44But building the collection hasn't been without difficulty.

00:47This Greek amphora was bought from Sotheby's of London.

00:51In 2022 the ANU became aware, via the Italian government, that it had been stolen by the

00:57Tomberoli or tomb robbers.

00:59They had a Polaroid photograph that had been seized from a known dealer in illicit antiquities

01:05and it matched our object.

01:07It's been repatriated and is now on loan from the Italian government.

01:11It's a very serious thing to have an object that was looted.

01:14Like many museums, they no longer collect objects.

01:17Basically it's just too risky.

01:18Instead what we're doing is that we're raising awareness about the ancient illicit antiquities market.

01:26Each object tells a story.

01:28This humble big toe was found at a dig site in Syria,

01:32but the marble was found to have come from the Greek island of Paros.

01:36This is a dynamic world with a lot of change and movement of people, of objects, of materials.

01:42A foot in the door to knowledge of the ancient world.

01:49Along with precious objects was found,

01:50This Robert just talked to the into account.

01:50The time of economic objects may take place.

01:50We were doing friends and을지�지 for two sessions.

01:50Now we don't change the ab repository thus the milliseconds.

01:51Car purity is collected on.'

01:51It wasn't quite as easy,

01:51It's nudity is filled with animals in which a good way.

01:51You

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