Collections, Archaeology - Wesleyan University

Wesleyan Home → Archaeology → The Collections

Wesleyan University's Archaeology and Anthropology Collections contain over 30,000 archaeological and ethnographic objects from around the world, plus fossil casts, animal skeletons, and other non-cultural items used in the hands-on teaching of archaeology, biological anthropology and comparative anatomy.

From stone axes produced by human ancestors in the Middle East roughly 400,000 years ago to nineteenth-century teapots once used by Middletown merchant society, from toys and personal adornments to weapons and coinage, these diverse holdings from six continents form an irreplaceable resource with intrinsic cultural value and great potential educational value across a variety of disciplines.

For the past decade the Archaeology Program has been making a concerted effort to rehabilitate the collections and facilitate their use by students, educators, scholars, and stakeholders. This site is part of that effort, intended to raise awareness of the collections and, in time, provide a venue for related student research.

This gold solidus of Justinian I, ca. 527-565 CE, is part of a coin collection left to Wesleyan by Classical Studies major Winthrop Dahl '84.

Te Rangi Hiroa (Sir Peter H. Buck), pioneering Maori anthropologist and doctor, borrowed this Mangaian fan following a 1939 visit to the collections in order to study how it was made and share this knowledge back into the artisan community.

Remember Pelton's Drug Store? Founding partner Charles Abner's initials are embossed on this ca. 1880 - ca. 1920 medicine bottle, salvaged by archaeology students during Middletown's Main Street redevelopment in the 1970s.

This bronze medal from the 1900 Paris World's Fair was awarded to Wesleyan's own Wilbur O. Atwater, a pioneer in the field of human nutrition. It was designed by French artist Jules-Clément Chaplain in the burgeoning Art Nouveau style.

Wesleyan's collections contain numerous samples of indigenous plants and foodstuffs, such as this dried bread, collected during John Wesley Powell's expeditions to the American West in the late 19th century.

18th-century Middletown, CT, was a hub of global trade. This dish, excavated at the Charles Magill House on Union Street, was made over 3,000 miles away in Rouen, France ca. 1780-1790.

Behind its dramatic-looking tusks, a walrus has a mouthful of smaller, blunt teeth perfect for crushing bivalve shells. Teeth provide a wealth of information to archaeologists; they can help reveal environment, diet, health and age-at-death.

This faience shabti figurine was reportedly obtained for Classics professor James C. van Benschoten by Egyptologist Flinders Petrie. Somehow, the two fragments ended up split between a private collection and objects left to the Wesleyan Museum. After spending over a century apart, the feet and upper body were reunited in 2005.

Not all scrimshaw was made of whale teeth or walrus ivory. This is a detail of an engraved dolphin mandible. A portion of the bone is missing, but it appears to depict a three-masted, ship-rigged American vessel sailing on a choppy green sea.

Long before Romans minted actual coins, rough lumps of unworked bronze, or aes rude, were used in trade on the Italian peninsula.

Sometimes unmodified natural objects have deep cultural significance. These cowry shells were collected and displayed in the 19th century as examples of local currency in parts of Africa and India.

West Africa has a rich tradition of iron working going back thousands of years. These 19th-century bellows would have been worked by a blacksmith's assistant, pumping air through the chambers by means of sticks attached to their hide covers.

According to accession records, the former Wesleyan Museum acquired a great number of gemstones around the turn of the century. Few remain in the current collections save red coral beads and carved mother of pearl items like this brooch.

It's not every day that a discarded cooking pot gets a close-up, but in 1959 this Nehantic vessel found on Millstone Point, CT, was featured in The Niantic News. Over 20 column inches were devoted to the tale of its manufacture, use, and rediscovery, pointing to a local interest in archaeology and indigenous technology.

This Minoan seal-stone is one of the many intriguing artifacts former Classics professor James C. van Benschoten obtained during his travels. It depicts a bull-leaper in mid-flight, somersaulting over the beast's back after releasing its horns. Similar images are depicted in Minoan sculpture and frescoes.

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