This past Tuesday, we visited the British museum to take a look at artifacts from the middle east. It was my first time visiting this particular museum and it absolutely blew me away. We went on a tour guided by the sweetest British lady to look at artifacts specifically from Mesopotamia and the region around it. To me, the most interesting artifacts, while not prehistorical, were the stone tablets from the library of Alexander the great. To see the tiny writing across so many different subjects was an incredible reminder of the beginning of scholarly writing and how it has evolved into the journals we read online today. Among many other things, we took a look at a drinking trough made by ancient Assyrians with various designs including flowers. We also took a look at a depiction of movement as painted by ancient Assyrians. This artifact featured a horse-drawn chariot standing still, then the horse walking, then galloping, with the chariot running over enemies. Our guides shared that this is the first depiction of movement in history. 

     After our guided tour, we perused some features located in the Ancient Egypt sculpture room, including the Rosetta Stone. The Rosetta Stone was used to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphics, therefore allowed scholars to more fully understand ancient Egypt. In the exhibit on ancient Greece and the Parthenon, we came across a statue of Venus, the goddess of love, as well as various headless statues taken from the Parthenon. There were also large wall panels with carvings of ancient Greeks taken from the same site. Overall, I cannot wait to explore the British Museum again, even if it takes me multiple times to see everything!