British Museum
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for British Museum. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
a national collection of science, literature and the arts. It is one of the attractive features of London. The present building occupies the site of the old Montague House mentioned in English literature . It is built in the form of a hollow square, with two-story galleries and a basement. The principal front, a block in length, faces Russell Street and is adorned with a colonnade of forty-four Ionic columns. The collections were begun with a gift of coins, antiquities, and books from Sir Hans Sloane in 1753. By act of Parliament a copy of every newspaper, book, pamphlet, or sheet of music copyrighted in the Empire is forwarded to the Museum. In 1857 it was found necessary to fill the interior of the square with a library building. A fine reading room in the center under a circular dome is within easy access of 2,500,000 printed volumes and many thousand priceless manuscripts. Desks are provided for 300 readers--altogether the greatest reading room in the world for scholars. Catalogs are at hand and attendants bring whatever is desired. New books are coming in at the rate of 60,000 a year. There are forty-three miles of shelves. The building cost nearly $4,000,000. The library is the greatest in the world. The most valuable single volume is a Mazarin Bible, the first book printed with movable type. The entire contents of the Museum are arranged in eight departments in the care of a staff of 320 persons. The management is in the hands of forty-eight trustees, including the Archbishop of Canterbury, the lord chancellor, and the speaker of the House of Commons. It is impossible to enumerate the contents of the galleries and cabinets. Volumes, not pages, are required to enter the names. The first editions, rare books, and the manuscript writings of such people as Luther, Newton, Galileo, Burke, Cromwell, Milton, Gustavus Adolphus, Mary, Queen of Scots, Napoleon, Byron, Franklin, Frederick the Great, and a thousand others fill many a cabinet. The Roman gallery, the Assyrian gallery, the Hellenic room, and the hall of Egyptian antiquities present an orderly but overwhelming array of coins, casts, busts, vases, statues, weapons and armor, winged lions in stone from Nineveh, Etruscan vases of unknown antiquity, mummies from the Egyptian pyramids, and Theban sculpture in granite, alabaster, and sandstone. The Rosetta Stone is here, as well as fragments of papyrus rolls from the Nile and specimens of the hieroglyphics of the priests and the cuneiform writing of Babylon. Not the least interesting are antiquities of the period when Roman legions and Roman civilization prevailed in England. There are enough unread inscriptions to keep scholars busy for a century. The natural history collections, the most instructive in the world, have been removed to a special building in front of Kensington Gardens. Scholars and sightseers visit the old museum. School children go to the new museum of natural history to see the birds' nests, plants, and mounted animals. 2026 Editor's Note: The Museum now holds some eight million objects and admits visitors free — and is at the center of the world's fiercest arguments over restitution . Greece has pressed for a century for the return of the Parthenon Marbles, and Nigeria for the Benin Bronzes looted in 1897; other museums have begun handing such objects back, leaving the British Museum increasingly isolated. (Ed: BR 2026-06-08)
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the great Naowes its London tional Museum in Hans foundation to Sir Sloane, who, in collections, 1753, bequeathed his various books and manuscripts, including 50,000 condition of £20,to th to the nation, on the 000 - less by £ 30,000 than the original cost - being paid to his heirs. Montague House, which was bought for the purappropriated for pose for £10,250, was , which was first opened on the museum The original edifice hav- Jan. 15, 1759. a new building ing become inadequate, street was resolved in Great Russell being Sir R. upon in 1823, the architect building was not com- Smirke, whose , a new library pleted till 1847. In 1857 and opened at a building was completed It contains a circular cost of £150,000. diameter, with reading room 140 feet in in height. This room a dome 106 feet for 300 readcontains accommodations separate desks. ers comfortably seated at having become again The accommodation history departinadequate the natural a new Natural Hisment was lodged in Kensington. tory Museum at South the Great Russell Further additions to made in 1882. The street buildings were under the manage- British Museum is open daily, ment of 48 trustees. It is to the readfree of charge. Admission Southern Nigeria, the ing room as a regular reader is by , ticket, procurable on application to the West Africa, East Africa chief librarian. The library, which is and most valunow one of the largest , has been enriched by able in the world gifts, among numerous bequests and library collected by others the splendid lon long reign. A George III. during his pamphlet, newscopy of every book, etc., published paper, piece of music, territory, must be anywhere in British to the British conveyed free of charge contains eight Museum. The museum , the deprincipal departments, namely , maps, charts, partment of printed books of manuplans, etc.; the department scripts; the department of natural history; the department of Oriental antiquities; the department of Greek and Roman antiquities; the department of coins and medals; the department of British and medieval antiquities and ethnography; and the department of prints and drawings.