THE BRITISH MUSEUM

Negrușă Raluca Ariana

■ The British Museum is
a public museum
dedicated to human
history, art and culture
located in the
Bloomsbury. This was
the first public national
museum to cover all
fields of knowledge.
■ Its permanent collection of
eight million works is
among the largest and most
comprehensive in existence.
It documents the story of
human culture from its
beginnings to the present.
■ The museum was
established in 1753,
largely based on the
collection of the Anglo-
Irish physician and
scientist Sir Hans Sloane.
It first opened to the
public in 1759, is
Montagu House, on the
sites of current building.
■ In 1973, the British Library
Act 1972 detached the library
department from the British
Museum, but it continued to
host the now separated British
Library in the same Reading
Room and building as the
museum until 1997.