The Dorset County Museum is located in
Dorchester, Dorset
Dorchester ( ) is the county town of Dorset, England. It is situated between Poole and Bridport on the A35 trunk route. A historic market town, Dorchester is on the banks of the River Frome to the south of the Dorset Downs and north of the ...
,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
. Founded in 1846, the museum covers the county of
Dorset
Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...
's history and environment. The current building was built in 1881 on the former site of the George Inn. The building was designed specifically to house the museum's collection and is in the
neo-Gothic
Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...
style.
The museum includes information and over 2 million artifacts associated with archaeology (e.g.,
Maiden Castle),
geology
Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other astronomical objects, the features or rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Ear ...
(e.g., the
Jurassic Coast
The Jurassic Coast is a World Heritage Site on the English Channel coast of southern England. It stretches from Exmouth in East Devon to Studland Bay in Dorset, a distance of about , and was inscribed on the World Heritage List in mid-December ...
),
history
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...
, local writers (e.g.
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...
) and natural science. There are
video display
A display device is an output device for presentation of information in visual or tactile form (the latter used for example in tactile electronic displays for blind people). When the input information that is supplied has an electrical signal the ...
s, activity carts for children, and an
audio guide. The collections include fossilised
dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...
footprints,
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 ancient Rome
*''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...
mosaics and original Thomas Hardy manuscripts.
Museum
The museum was founded in 1846, and includes two significant collections, the archive of
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...
's works and fossils from the
Jurassic Coast
The Jurassic Coast is a World Heritage Site on the English Channel coast of southern England. It stretches from Exmouth in East Devon to Studland Bay in Dorset, a distance of about , and was inscribed on the World Heritage List in mid-December ...
. The total collection extends to approximately four million items. The museum is owned by the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society.
Many items in the museum's collection have been stored at the nearby
All Saints' Church
All Saints Church, or All Saints' Church or variations on the name may refer to:
Albania
*All Saints' Church, Himarë
Australia
* All Saints Church, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory
* All Saints Anglican Church, Henley Brook, Western Aust ...
.
The museum was receiving approximately 45,000 visitors each year in 2014, which had increased to 47,000 visitors in 2016.
TripAdvisor has awarded its Certificate of Excellence Award to the museum for four years in a row.
In 2016, the museum unveiled plans for a £13 million extension which would include a learning centre, cafe, library and shop, allowing the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society's full collection to hold together in one building.
Three quarters of the funding for the extension would be put forward by the
Heritage Lottery 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 ...
, allowing much more of the collection to be viewed. Without the extension, less than two percent of the museum's collection is on display.
The museum closed in October 2018 to undergo refurbishment and the construction of the extension.
It reopened on 29 May 2021 after the re-opening was delayed due to the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...
.
The cost of the work came to £16.4 million.
[ ]
Exhibits
Thomas Hardy was one of the founders of the museum, and over seven thousand artefacts related to him are in the museum's collection, including an 1874 first edition copy of ''
Far From The Madding Crowd
''Far from the Madding Crowd'' (1874) is Thomas Hardy's fourth novel and his first major literary success. It originally appeared anonymously as a monthly serial in ''Cornhill Magazine'', where it gained a wide readership.
The novel is set in ...
''. Other items in the Hardy archive include his handwritten manuscript for ''
The Woodlanders
''The Woodlanders'' is a novel by Thomas Hardy. It was serialised from May 1886 to April 1887 in ''Macmillan's Magazine'' and published in three volumes in 1887. It is one of his series of Wessex novels.
Plot summary
The story takes place in ...
'', his sister's dress which is thought to be inspiration for the dress in ''
Tess of the d'Urbervilles,'' and a reconstruction of Hardy's study.
The Ancient Dorset Gallery was opened by
Julian Richards in November 2015 and includes
Viking
Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden),
who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...
historical artefacts from a nearby burial site. Other artefacts include pre-historic flint
hand axe
A hand axe (or handaxe or Acheulean hand axe) is a prehistoric stone tool with two faces that is the longest-used tool in human history, yet there is no academic consensus on what they were used for. It is made from stone, usually flint or che ...
s, a Roman glass bowl and an
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
bronze mirror. The British Museum loaned three
neolithic
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...
jadeite
Jadeite is a pyroxene mineral with composition sodium, Naaluminium, Alsilicon, Si2oxygen, O6. It is hard (Mohs hardness of about 6.5 to 7.0), very tough, and dense, with a specific gravity of about 3.4. It is found in a wide range of colors, bu ...
axes and mace heads to the museum to add to the display.
In July 2016, the museum opened a gallery dedicated to the work of
William Barnes
William Barnes (22 February 1801 – 7 October 1886) was an English polymath, writer, poet, philologist, priest, mathematician, engraving artist and inventor. He wrote over 800 poems, some in Dorset dialect, and much other work, including a co ...
, telling the story of his humble roots to his legacy in poetry, novels and music. The gallery was opened by Bonny Sartin, lead singer of
The Yetties.
In 2018
Dippy
Dippy is a composite ''Diplodocus'' skeleton in Pittsburgh's Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and the holotype of the species ''Diplodocus carnegii''. It is considered the most famous single dinosaur skeleton in the world, due to the numerous ...
, a plaster-cast of a dinosaur which was usually housed in the
Natural History Museum, London
The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum an ...
, was exhibited at the Dorset County Museum from 10 February 2018 to the 7 May 2018.
![Mosaic2 - plw](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Mosaic2_-_plw.jpg)
On 2 August 2019,
Hinton St Mary
Hinton St Mary is a village and civil parish in Dorset, southern England. It is sited on a low Corallian limestone ridge beside the River Stour, north of the market town Sturminster Newton. In 2001 the parish had 97 households and a populatio ...
villagers and the Chair of the
Dorset Unitary Authority were told at a closed-door meeting with the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
that the
Hinton St Mary Mosaic would be partially returned to the Dorset County Museum. However, the head of Christ would not be returned, as the original would be “loaned to museums worldwide”. A replica would be given to the Dorset County Museum.
No answer was given to one attendee’s question that: “Given that she
British Museum curatorboasted the fact that the replicas they made were indistinguishable from the originals, surely it would make more sense to send the replica around the world and keep the original safe in Dorset?”
It is not clear whether the complete mosaic or only a part of it will be displayed in Dorset County Museum. The Association for the Study and Preservation of Roman Mosaics has stated: “the mosaic possibly contains the only known representation of Christ in an ancient pavement, it is of unique importance not just in Britain but in the context of the Roman Empire as a whole, and merits being displayed in its entirety. It is insufficient to show the central roundel in isolation, however important. The full meaning of the pavement can be appreciated only if the whole of it is visible, including the accompanying heads and figure scenes”.
In July 2022 the Blackmore Vale newspaper reported that "discussions are at an advanced stage with a view to bringing the important Roman artefact to the Dorset County Museum in
Dorchester or another site."
Building
Dorset County Museum is on High West Street in Dorchester, Dorset. Built from
Portland stone
Portland stone is a limestone from the Tithonian stage of the Jurassic period quarried on the Isle of Portland, Dorset. The quarries are cut in beds of white-grey limestone separated by chert beds. It has been used extensively as a building sto ...
in approximately 1881, it was designed by architects G R Crickmay and Son from Weymouth. The building is two storeys high with a slate roof, it has two
stringcourses on the
gently sloped walls, with
hood mould
In architecture, a hood mould, hood, label mould (from Latin ''labia'', lip), drip mould or dripstone, is an external moulded projection from a wall over an opening to throw off rainwater, historically often in form of a ''pediment''. This mouldin ...
s over the windows and a
crenellated
A battlement in defensive architecture, such as that of city walls or castles, comprises a parapet (i.e., a defensive low wall between chest-height and head-height), in which gaps or indentations, which are often rectangular, occur at interva ...
parapet
A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). Whe ...
. The frontage includes a 2-storey bay with 7
transom
Transom may refer to:
* Transom (architecture), a bar of wood or stone across the top of a door or window, or the window above such a bar
* Transom (nautical), that part of the stern of a vessel where the two sides of its hull meet
* Operation Tran ...
windows. At the top of the bay there is a
trefoil
A trefoil () is a graphic form composed of the outline of three overlapping rings, used in architecture and Christian symbolism, among other areas. The term is also applied to other symbols with a threefold shape. A similar shape with four rin ...
-headed panel displaying the Dorchester
coat of arms
A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...
.
The cast-iron columns and the other metalwork in the aisled Victorian Hall were cast in Frome by Edward Cockey & Sons.
On the first floor there is an
oriel window
An oriel window is a form of bay window which protrudes from the main wall of a building but does not reach to the ground. Supported by corbels, bracket (architecture), brackets, or similar cantilevers, an oriel window is most commonly found pro ...
in the corner, above carved
squinch
In architecture, a squinch is a triangular corner that supports the base of a dome. Its visual purpose is to translate a rectangle into an octagon. See also: pendentive.
Construction
A squinch is typically formed by a masonry arch that spans ...
es. The door is to the left of the bay, displaying three coats of arms above. The building was designated Grade II
listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
status on 8 May 1975, as part of a group with the nearby
Shire Hall,
Holy Trinity Church and
St. Peter's Church.
To the rear of the building, the museum also owns
John White's
rectory
A clergy house is the residence, or former residence, of one or more priests or ministers of religion. Residences of this type can have a variety of names, such as manse, parsonage, rectory or vicarage.
Function
A clergy house is typically ow ...
, where he resided whilst obtaining charters for the colonisation of
.
References
External links
Dorset County Museum
{{Authority control
1846 establishments in England
Cultural infrastructure completed in 1881
Museums in Dorchester, Dorset
Art museums and galleries in Dorset
Natural history museums in England
Local museums in Dorset
Museums established in 1846
Gothic Revival architecture in Dorset