EXHIBITION: EGYPTIANS, GODS & MUMMIES – TRAVELS WITH HERODOTUS

Strolling through the grounds of Sydney University has a certain transportive element in itself, all that old sandstone and well-tended lawn. Stepping into the Nicholson Museum, tucked unobtrusively in one of the buildings on the Quadrangle, I was totally unprepared for the incredible collection of artefacts spread before me. The exhibition is centred around Herodotus and his travels through Egypt in the mid-400s BC and is a veritable smorgasbord of culture. Forget replicas and reconstructions and think real, pristinely preserved, 7000 year old mummies, pottery, art works and texts. Herodotus travelled the known world documenting everything from mummification practices to the movements of the river Nile to the sexual proclivities of the locals and is now considered to be the first historian, ethnographer and anthropologist. His Histories are stories of the people and the artefacts on display at the Nicholson Museum are mind-boggling testament to that. Take an afternoon to head down and check it out, you won’t be disappointed. And if you do so on a Sunday, you can absorb some wise words in the Free Egyptian Talk Series, including The Curse of Tutankhamun on Sept 6.

Until end of 2010, Nicholson Museum, Main Quadrangle, University of Sydney, 9351 2812 or usyd.edu.au