The Wiltshire Museum, formerly known as Wiltshire Heritage Museum and Devizes Museum, is a museum, archive and library and art gallery established in 1874 in

Devizes Devizes () is a market town and civil parish in Wiltshire, England. It developed around Devizes Castle, an 11th-century Norman architecture, Norman castle, and received a charter in 1141. The castle was besieged during the Anarchy, a 12th-cent ...

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated to Wilts) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It borders Gloucestershire to the north, Oxfordshire to the north-east, Berkshire to the east, Hampshire to the south-east, Dorset to the south, and Somerset to ...

, England. The museum was created and is run by the Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, a registered charity founded in 1853.

History

The society bought a former grammar school on Long Street, south of the town's market place, to house the museum. It later expanded into two Georgian houses on either side, and still occupies these premises today. The museum maintains a collection covering the

archaeology Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

, art, history and

natural history Natural history is a domain of inquiry involving organisms, including animals, fungi, and plants, in their natural environment, leaning more towards observational than experimental methods of study. A person who studies natural history is cal ...

of Wiltshire. The collection covers periods of history from as far back as the

Palaeolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic ( years ago) ( ), also called the Old Stone Age (), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost the entire period of human prehist ...

and also has

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

Saxon The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like th ...

Mediaeval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and t ...

and more recent historical artefacts. Among the prehistoric collections are items from the Stonehenge and Avebury World Heritage Site. Several of the collections have been designated as being a significant part of England's

cultural heritage Cultural heritage is the heritage of tangible and intangible heritage assets of a group or society that is inherited from past generations. Not all heritages of past generations are "heritage"; rather, heritage is a product of selection by socie ...

. One of the most important collections at the museum is the finds from Bush Barrow, an early Bronze Age

burial mound Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...

in the Stonehenge area. The barrow was excavated by William Cunnington in 1808 and produced the richest and most important finds from a Bronze Age grave in the Stonehenge Landscape to date. The finds were acquired by the museum in 1883 and were displayed there until 1922, when they were indefinitely loaned to the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

. After a controversial restoration of the largest piece that may not reflect its original finish, the pieces were returned to Devizes in 1985. The natural history collection includes remains of a

plesiosaur The Plesiosauria or plesiosaurs are an Order (biology), order or clade of extinct Mesozoic marine reptiles, belonging to the Sauropterygia. Plesiosaurs first appeared in the latest Triassic Period (geology), Period, possibly in the Rhaetian st ...

called

Bathyspondylus ''Bathyspondylus'' is an extinct genus of plesiosaur from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation of Swindon, England. Because it is known only from its fossil vertebrae (and so few of those have been recovered), paleontologists are not entirely sure of ...

found at

Swindon Swindon () is a town in Wiltshire, England. At the time of the 2021 Census the population of the built-up area was 183,638, making it the largest settlement in the county. Located at the northeastern edge of the South West England region, Swi ...

in 1774. ''Bathyspondylus swindoniensis'' was first described in 1982 from the museum's specimens.

Exhibitions

Since 2013, a permanent exhibition ''Gold from the Time of Stonehenge'' displays 30 pieces of Early Bronze Age gold, including the Bush Barrow finds. The museum held a major exhibition of works by

Eric Ravilious Eric William Ravilious (22 July 1903 – 2 September 1942) was a British painter, designer, book illustrator and wood-engraver. He grew up in Sussex, and is particularly known for his watercolours of the South Downs, Castle Hedingham and othe ...

titled ''Eric Ravilious: Downland Man'' from September 2021 until January 2022. It featured loans from a number of institutions, including the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (abbreviated V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.8 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen ...

, the

Imperial War Museum The Imperial War Museum (IWM), currently branded "Imperial War Museums", is a British national museum. It is headquartered in London, with five branches in England. Founded as the Imperial War Museum in 1917, it was intended to record the civ ...

and the Towner Eastbourne gallery, as well as works from private collections.

Future premises

Since 2018, there has been an intention to relocate the museum to the former

Devizes Assize Court Devizes Assize Court is a judicial building in Northgate Street in Devizes, a town in Wiltshire, England. The building, which is currently vacant and deteriorating, is a Grade II* listed building. History The building was designed by Thomas Hen ...

in the northwest quarter of Devizes town centre. In June 2023, Wiltshire Museum received £300,000 from the

National Lottery Heritage Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

to enable the museum – working closely with the Assize Court Trust – to develop plans for the project before applying for a full National Lottery grant in 2025.

References

External links

* {{Stonehenge Bronze Age England Museums in Wiltshire Stonehenge Archaeological museums in England Natural history museums in England Libraries in Wiltshire Museums established in 1873 1873 establishments in England Devizes

History

Exhibitions

Future premises

See also

References

External links