accounts, &.c., of the british museum. 33 



Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. 



I. — Arrangement and Cataloguing. 

 Egyptian Division: — 



A gold figure of Ra and shrine, twenty-four other figures, a ?tone head, eiglitecn 

 bronze figures; a large granite inscription from Assouan, ten other iiii-cripiioiis, a pitce 

 of inscribed sandstone and two coffins have been mounted on plinths or pedestals of 

 marble, Caen stone, or granite. Twenty necklaces and sixteen other objects have also 

 been mounted. 



An Egyptian sarcophagus, several sculptures, two coffins, five figures, five vas^es, 

 thirteen ostraka, and thirteen other objects have been rej)aired, and dusted wliere 

 necessary. 



An inscription has been fixed on one of the gallery walls. Stone shelves in the 

 Egyptian Gallery, plaster-casts ; some Egyptian sculptures, cofiins, mummies and their 

 cases, inscriptions, tablets, and other objects have been removed and replaced in more 

 suitable positions for exhibition, the cases haying been altered, and some of them lepainted 

 in the meanwhile. 



The ostraka have been arranged in boxes, and other objects have been placed in cases, 

 as catalogued. 



Thirty- nine papyri have been mounted in glass sheets, and forty-nine repaired. Other 

 papyri have been cut up and arranged for mounting. Four jjapyri and a piece of Ijnen 

 have been unrolled. The Egyptian Galleries have been cleaned, and the store and 

 store-cast rooms dusted. 



Sixty -five stands have been made for terra-cotta jars, and one for papyri, 'i hree box- 

 frames have been made for stelce. One thousand and twenty-seven miscellaneous objects, 

 and twenty-two gnostic gems have been mounted on wooden plinths, or on tablets 

 covered with cloth or velvet. Six hundred and twenty-four })linths and satin-wood 

 pedestals have been prepared for future mountings, and a case has been made for a 

 pair of sandals. Shelves, sliding-trays, and divisions have been provided where necessary 

 in the presses in the studies and in the students' room, and fittings have been prepared for 

 table-cases ; mahogany labels have been made for cases in the Egyptian Galier3\ 



Four hundred and seven objects have been catalogued, new catalogue slips incor- 

 porated, and catalogue numbers of one thousand three hundred ostraka have l)een 

 entered in the register ; one thousand six hundred and five objects of the various 

 collections (including sixty-six belonging to the last received Egyptian Exploration Fund 

 Collection and twenty-six papyrus fragments) have been registered. 'I hree hundred and 

 fifty-three labels have been written for miscellaneous objects; a list of the papyri has 

 been made. The hand-list and the case-book and arrangement of the papyri liave been 

 continued ; seven thousand two hundred and seventeen numbers have been printed, and 

 four thousand and fifty-two attached to objects, and one hundred and seventy-seven 

 objects have been re- numbered; twenty-eight papyri numbers, and thirty-three labels 

 have been printed, and one thousand one hundred and eighty-eight pressmarks have 

 been printed in duplicate and affixed to papyri ; the list of registration numbers has been 

 continued, and a list of altered numbers prepared. Four hundred and forty-three labels 

 have been painted. The guide to the Egyptian Room has been cut up, and re- arranged 

 for a new edition. 



Assyrian and Babylonian section : 



I. 1,000 tablets and othes objects have been registered ; upwards of two thousand 

 tablets liave been placed in boxes ; 1,334 tablets have been placed in numbered and 

 labelled boxes ; six collections of Babylonian tablets, &c., numbering about one hundred 

 objecis, offered for purchase to the Museum, have been examined, and selections made 

 from two of these collections ; one hundred and' fifty-eight descriptive labels have been 

 printed; one hundred and eighty Babylonian tablets have been copied; seventy-eight 

 tablets and fragments have been joined; labels have been affixed to twenty- six mounted 

 gems; nineteen tablets have been cleaned ; four figures have been cleaned and repaired; 

 five additional contract-tablets have been copied, and six translated for the Corpus 

 Inscriptionum Semiticarum. Several tablets of the "Daily Telegiaph" Collection, and 

 several published texts have been identified ; corresponding portions of several Assyrian 

 tablets unciently broken have been found; students have been assisted and attended in 

 their researches ; special tablets of the various collections have been examined at the 

 request of students and others ; and the collections have been several times described 

 and explained to classes and parties of students. Twenty-two cylinder-.eeals have been 

 described for the projected catalogue of these objects, and the inscriptions copied and 

 translated. 



II. The tablets of the Kouyunjik Collection up to K. 6253 have been transferred to the 

 new trays prepared for them in the Students' Room, placed in numbered boxes, and 

 arranged in order; the S. (Smith), D.T. ("Daily Telegraph "), R"". (Rassam), Rm. 2, 

 79-7-8, and 81-7-27 collections, with the Assyrian portion of the 82-3-23 collection, 



0.66. E have 



