The British Museum

About The British Museum

The videos below can be seen on Smarthistory because The British Museum generously makes their videos available for distribution.

Reading Assyrian art isn't easy — but it's always worth it.

Assyria vs Elam: The battle of Til ...

Ashurbanipal wasn't just an Assyrian king, he was a propaganda king.

The palace decoration of Ashurbanipal

Rock art is one of the best records of the life of past peoples who lived across the Sahara.

Rock Art in the Green Sahara (Africa)

Rock art is one of the best records of the life of past peoples who lived across the Sahara.

Rock Art in the Green Sahara (Neolithic)

Clovis culture — The first clear evidence of human activity in North America are spearheads used to hunt large game.

Clovis culture

Hajj — The sacred pilgrimage to Mecca—birthplace of Prophet Muhammad—involves a series of rituals and lasts several days.

Hajj

Jade Cong — These enigmatic, rectilinear tubes reveal clarity of thought and took great effort to produce. What can they mean?

Jade Cong

Handaxe, Paleolithic — Fire, clothing, or the wheel: was this humble hand axe the earliest human technology?

Our earliest technology?

Jericho Skull — Is the plaster face on this skull modeled after a real person? Is it one of the world’s oldest portraits?

The Jericho Skull

Lion Man — The cave lion was the fiercest animal of the ice age, and this mammoth ivory carving combines human with lion.

Lion Man

C is for Cleaning, F is for Fills, I is for Inpainting… Learn an alphabet of terms used by conservators.

Conservation glossary of terms

Research scientists find out what objects are made of, where they’re from, and how they were constructed.

Scientific research glossary of terms

What was the first bill of human rights? This seal encouraged freedom of worship throughout the Persian Empire.

The Cyrus Cylinder and Ancient Persia

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Easter Island Moai

Snakes shedding their skin was a powerful metaphor for the Aztecs and is reflected in their pantheon of gods.

A-level: Double-headed serpent

Albrecht Dürer and others, The Triumphal Arch, c. 1515, woodcut printed from 192 individual blocks, 357 x 295 cm, Germany © Trustees of the British Museum. — Emperor Maximilian I employed Dürer to create a Triumphal Arch. It remains one of the largest prints ever produced.

A-level: Albrecht Dürer

Medieval craftsmen decorated metal by hammering from behind, a technique called repoussé. Watch it here!

Medieval Goldsmiths

Belt Buckle, Sutton Hoo, early 7th century, gold, 13.2 x 5.6 cm © Trustees of the British Museum — Excavated in 1939, this 7th-century grave once held a hoard of metalwork, all buried within a 27-meter long ship!

Sutton Hoo Ship Burial

The Sutton Hoo purse lid- detail — Rendered in gold and garnet, the enigmatic animals on this purse lid stand out above white bone.

The Sutton Hoo purse lid

The Sutton Hoo helmet, early 7th century, iron and tinned copper alloy helmet, consisting of many pieces of iron, now built into a reconstruction, 31.8 x 21.5 cm (as restored) © Trustees of the British Museum — Restored, dismantled, and restored again, this helmet was a pile of rusted iron and tinned bronze when first discovered.

The Sutton Hoo helmet