Sedgwick Museum Director Liz Hide explores how Darwin's specimens don't just tell us about the development of his geological theories, but also give us a glimpse into nineteenth-century resource extraction and global economic networks.

Hear about the geology of the summit of Everest

Here how the first ever rock specimen collected from the summit of Mount Everest ended up at the Sedgwick Museum

Credits:

Written by Annabel Worth and Kirsten Huffer

Read by Annabel

Audio editing by Emma Pratt

This piece concerns the Iguanodon fossil cast in the Sedgwick museum.

"For us this was a really important story to tell, as it highlights how the university has benefited, and continues to benefit, from slavery and colonialism, in a way that is usually hidden. One can appreciate the object itself, marvel at its great size, thinking how amazing it is that something like this ever existed, and be excited about all it has taught us about dinosaur biomechanics and movement, but we believe it is necessary to recognise its history, as well as past wrongdoing by the university and others. Despite the obvious benefits of having such a wonderful cast in our possession, both in terms of academic study and inspiring and exciting the public, this piece’s origins are complex and dark. As you will hear, the dinosaur could be considered part of Leopold II’s attempt to encourage his European neighbours to overlook the suffering being inflicted on the people of the Congo at the end of the 19th century - something which deserves to be acknowledged."

This audio was created as part of Museum Remix 2023, coinciding with the University of Cambridge Museums’ programme of Power and Memory. It was put together by Kiki Bordean, Heidi McEvoy-Swift and Katrina Dring with the help of the Museum Remix and wider UCM teams.

The Museum of Classical Archaeology is filled with sculptural expressions of the human form, including many heads. In one corner of the gallery, nestled among a display of busts, are two heads with ragged, broken edges around the neck. These came from bronze sculptures of Roman emperors Augustus and Claudius; the sculptures having been decapitated as a symbol of resistance during local uprisings by the Kushite and Iceni, respectively. Nearby in the gallery is another instance of decapitation, this time carried out by the Roman Empire. The scene from Trajan’s column shows the severed heads of two Dacians being presented to Trajan on the battlefield; a symbol of Rome’s enduring power and expanding empire.

Rather than re-tell or verbally extend the information already given in the captions about these heads, we decided to complement it with a (hopefully!) thought-provoking collection of sounds. In the soundscape, we wanted to explore the circumstances of these heads – what they symbolise(d), how they came to be detached from their bodies, and how their stories both overlap and diverge. The wolf played an important role in Celtic, Dacian and Roman mythologies and, even today, is often seen as symbolic of wildness and freedom. We invite the listener to reflect on the themes of identity, power, and expression which we ourselves were occupied by during the two-day programme.

Featuring the voices of Kiki Bordean, Heidi McEvoy-Swift, Katrina Dring, Ruchika Gurung and Barney Brown.

The Museum as an institution is not neutral. A response to the colonial 1875 Jigsaw Globe on display in the Museum’s Globe Gallery.

Creators: Fu Ge Yang, Sally Yan and Annie Tomkins.

This audio was created as part of Museum Remix 2023, coinciding with the University of Cambridge Museums’ programme of Power and Memory.

This audio was created as part of Museum Remix 2023, coinciding with the University of Cambridge Museums’ programme of Power and Memory. It was put together by Kiki Bordean, Heidi McEvoy-Swift and Katrina Dring with the help of the Museum Remix and wider UCM teams.

The Museum of Classical Archaeology is filled with sculptural expressions of the human form, including many heads. In a small case near the entrance are four broken terracotta figurines from Naukratis, a Greek trading post in Egypt. These figurines have been suggested as having features which might indicate individuals of African heritage – features which are not often seen in other sculptures from the classical period. Who were they? The figurines were made from a mould so presumably lots of these figures were made. By whom? For what purpose? Sadly, we don’t know much more.

Rather than re-tell or verbally extend the information already given in the captions about these figurines, we decided to complement it with a (hopefully!) thought-provoking collection of sounds. In the soundscape, we wanted to explore the circumstances of these heads – what they symbolise(d), how they were made, used and broken, and what they might tell us about Greek life in Egypt. We invite the listener to reflect on the themes of identity, power, and expression which we ourselves were occupied by during the two-day programme.

Featuring the voices of Kiki Bordean, Heidi McEvoy-Swift, Katrina Dring, Ruchika Gurung and Barney Brown.

‘This Globe is Broken’. A poem about how the globe as an object is not neutral. A response to the colonial 1875 Jigsaw Globe on display in the Museum’s Globe Gallery.

Creator: Annie Tomkins.

This audio was created as part of Museum Remix 2023, coinciding with the University of Cambridge Museums’ programme of Power and Memory.

Credits:

Written by Annabel Worth, Kirsten Huffer and Emma Pratt

Read by Kirsten and Annabel

Audio editing and soundscape by Emma

This piece concerns Mary Anning's Icthyosaur in the Sedgwick museum.

Once upon a time, 200 million years ago, dolphin-like marine reptiles, or ichthyosaurs, like this one roamed the Jurassic Sea. About 200 years ago, Mary Anning, mother of paleontology, found this ichthyosaur fossil along the craggy cliffs of England's southern coast.

If fossils could talk, what would this ichthyosaur say? What could it tell us about the experiences of its collector, Mary Anning, who was widely excluded from scientific circles of her day? And what could it tell us about Adam Sedgwick, who purchased it—possibly with the money that he gained from the labour of enslaved people? What stories of power and memory, gender and colonialism, could this ichthyosaur bring to life?

Barra Journal: Audio by University of Cambridge Museums