Qualla: Durham University Oriental Museum

Durham University Oriental Museum: Introduction

Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Geni, CC BY-SA 4.0. In October 1969, NASA sent a fragment of Moon rock to Durham University's department of earth sciences. Before the analysis began, the rock was put on display at the Oriental Museum for two days. Twelve thousand people came to see it. The museum stayed open until 8:30 in the evening to handle the crowds. It is a strange detail, a piece of the Moon held briefly in a museum dedicated to art and archaeology from the other side of the world, but it captures something true about the Oriental Museum's appetite for the unexpected. The collection that began as a teaching aid for the School of Oriental Studies has been pulling in surprising objects ever since.

Image: Geni | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham University Oriental Museum: The Northumberland Collection

Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Geni, CC BY-SA 4.0. The museum's founding acquisition came from the Fourth Duke of Northumberland's collection, purchased in 1949 by William Thacker, Professor of Hebrew and Oriental Languages. Thacker stored the items, mostly Egyptian and Near Eastern artefacts, in two rooms at Hatfield College, wi...

Image: Geni | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham University Oriental Museum: Coronation Bronzes and Chinese Jades

Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Geni, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1953, as part of the celebrations for the Coronation of Elizabeth II, the Chinese lecturer Raymond Dawson curated an exhibition of loaned Chinese bronzes at Durham. Cosin's Library followed in 1954 with Chinese books and textiles. These two exhibitions changed the course of th...

Image: Geni | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham University Oriental Museum: The Two-Million Pound Theft

Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Geni, CC BY-SA 4.0. In April 2012, thieves broke into the Oriental Museum and stole Chinese artefacts valued at almost two million pounds. Two jade pieces and a porcelain figurine were taken. Police recovered the items within weeks. In 2013, two men were tried, convicted, and jailed for the burglary...

Image: Geni | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham University Oriental Museum: The Cloak Goes Home

Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Geni, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 2025, the museum returned an 18th-century Māori war cloak called a pauku to New Zealand on a five-year loan to the Auckland War Memorial Museum. The cloak had a rare Tāniko border and was one of only five known to exist in the world. It came to Durham on loan in the 1960s and ...

Image: Geni | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham University Oriental Museum: Forgotten Volunteers and Returned Flags

Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Geni, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 2017 the Oriental Museum staged the first exhibition held anywhere in Britain on the Chinese Labour Corps, the roughly 140,000 Chinese volunteers who assisted the British Army in the First World War, digging trenches and handling supplies on the Western Front. Their contributi...

Image: Geni | CC BY-SA 4.0