Swipe for the works and stories worth knowing before you go.
The Portland Vase (Roman cameo glass, about AD 1-25, Room 70)
In 1845 a young man, blaming a week-long drinking bout, smashed the vase and its showcase. The law only let him be charged for the case: a £3 fine, paid by an unknown benefactor. 37 unplaced chips then vanished for a century, until the museum's 1945 purchase prompted a box-maker's descendant to hand them back.
Sandra Smith, 'The Portland Vase', The Art of the Conservator (British Museum Press, 1992) · britishmuseum.org: The Portland Vase
The Parthenon sculptures (Room 18): the 1937-38 scraping
According to historian William St Clair, workmen in 1937-38 scraped the sculptures with copper tools, wire brushes and carborundum, because Lord Duveen, who was paying for their new gallery, wanted them whiter. A museum report admitted the damage was obvious and could not be exaggerated, and stayed secret until 1998.
The Art Newspaper (Martin Bailey): Parthenon Marbles conference report
Gebelein Man (about 3500 BC, Room 64)
For over a century nobody explained the cut on his left shoulder blade. His first CT scan, in 2012, showed it went deep into the muscle, broke the bone and shattered a rib: a single stab in the back, probably with a metal blade, that likely reached his lung. He was about 18 to 21, and his brain is still in his skull.
British Museum: Regarding the Dead (2015), Gebelein Man chapter
The Mildenhall Great Dish (4th century AD, Room 49)
Ploughman Gordon Butcher hit the hoard in 1942 and dug it out in a snowstorm, but his employer Sydney Ford took it home and displayed it on his sideboard. For over four years Ford insisted it was pewter, so not Treasure Trove, until museum tests in 1946 proved it silver. Roald Dahl later wrote up the story.
britishmuseum.org: The Mildenhall Great Dish · Current Archaeology: The Mildenhall Treasure, a secret history
The Rosetta Stone (196 BC, Room 4)
Fearing heavy bombing in 1917, the museum hid the Rosetta Stone for two years in a station of the Post Office's mail railway, 50 feet below Holborn: its only break from display since 1802. When it first arrived, the floors were too weak to bear it, so it sat in a temporary structure in the grounds.
britishmuseum.org: Everything you ever wanted to know about the Rosetta Stone
The Royal Game of Ur and its rulebook (Room 56)
Find the game's rulebook in case 16: a clay tablet a Babylonian scribe finished in 177-176 BC. In 1886 the museum catalogued it as star and bird omens, and only in 1960 did a scholar show it was about a game. Irving Finkel later used it to reconstruct the rules.
britishmuseum.org: tablet with rules for the Royal Game of Ur (33333,b) · Irving Finkel, 'On the Rules for the Royal Game of Ur' (British Museum Press, 2007)
The Sutton Hoo helmet (early 7th century, Room 41)
Look for a hidden bird on the face: the eyebrows are its wings, the nose its body, the moustache its tail. It emerged in Nigel Williams's 1971 rebuild, after he dismantled the 1946 version and laid out over 500 fragments, including a dragon's jaw found in a box marked 'head'. The brows hold 23 and 25 garnets.
Nigel Williams, 'The Sutton Hoo Helmet', The Art of the Conservator (British Museum Press, 1992) · britishmuseum.org: The Sutton Hoo Helmet
The Lycurgus Cup (Late Roman, AD 300s, Room 41)
In reflected light the glass looks opaque green, but shine a light through it and it glows red, thanks to tiny amounts of gold and silver in the glass. The gilded silver rim and foot are not Roman: according to the museum, they were probably added in the late 1700s.
britishmuseum.org: Room 41 large print guide · britishmuseum.org: The Lycurgus Cup
Hoa Hakananai'a, the Easter Island statue (Room 24)
Its name means 'lost, hidden or stolen friend'. It was once painted with red and white designs, which washed off when it was rafted out to the ship in 1869. Walk round the back: a University of Southampton study found carvings added while it stood half-buried, and bird-people watching a chick leave the nest.
britishmuseum.org: Hoa Hakananai'a · ScienceDaily: University of Southampton study (2013)
Emptying the museum in eight days, 1939
In 1939 staff moved over 150 tonnes of objects in eight days, sending the Sutton Hoo treasure into Aldwych tube station and the coins to a butler's pantry in Kettering. Fireman warders guarded the roofs with sand buckets and golf clubs for chipping away fire bombs. Much of the collection waited out the war in a former mushroom quarry.
britishmuseum.org: The British Museum and the Blitz, eight days to evacuate