All of our lectures are live streamed and are open to anyone to join us online, Fellows and Non-Fellows.
To view any of our past lectures please visit our YouTube channel.
To view any of our past lectures please visit our YouTube channel.
Join the Society of Antiquaries, both online and in-person, to explore the research potential of their archives, library and museum collections at Burlington House, and discover how their digitisation and cataloguing is progressing, and how this is enhancing their research potential.
The Society is home to over 40,000 objects, paintings, prints and drawings, and its world-renowned Library contains over 130,000 books and manuscripts. Its unique collections span many centuries of human history, from Palaeolithic stone tools to Tudor royal portraits, copies of the Magna Carta to illuminated manuscripts saved after the dissolution of the monasteries. The result of nearly 300 years of accumulation, the Society’s collection has a unique role in making rare and valuable material accessible to scholars and the visiting public.
The Society is delighted to have a fantastic set of speakers with us on the day to talk through how they’ve used our resources, as well as talks from our Library and Collections team, who will explain how to get the best out of us for your research.
Special Conference Bonus for those attending in person
Come to this event in person and get 3 free months of Affiliate membership, which gives you entry into Burlington House to use the Library and the workspace, WiFi and you can borrow up to 4 books!
Terms & Conditions
To get the three free months of Affiliate membership, you must:
If you are already an Affiliate member:
Schedule for the day (full day and final timings TBC):
9.30am: Registration opens, tea and coffee will be provided
10.00am: Introduction from President Martin Millett FSA on the Society and aims for the day.
10.30am: Presentations from the Library and Collections team on the digital platform, archives, Library, Museum collection
11.30am: Tour of the premises at Burlington House (not available for online participants)
12.15pm: Lunch break followed by
1pm: Robert Hill FRCS FSA – CT scanning in the Investigation of an Anglo Saxon Burial Urn
In this presentation he discusses the use of CT scanning in the investigation of an Anglo Saxon Burial Urn in the Society’s own Museum. The provenance of the urn is not known but by repute it was supposed to contain a bracelet amongst the cremation ashes. It did not seem right or respectful to empty the urn but scanning the urn might be a way of identifying the contents. Find out what was found.
Robert Hill is an Orthopaedic Surgeon and Honorary Associate Professor at UCL. For some years, in addition to his specialist medical work, he has had an interest in swords, particularly medieval and Viking, and in using medical imaging techniques such as CT scanning in the scientific investigation of various types of artefacts. He has contributed to published work on the funeral achievements of Henry V in Westminster Abbey, Egyptian Animal Mummies, Italian Sculptures and Viking Swords. He is a Council member of the Arms and Armour Society and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.
1:30pm: Dr Ann Benson FSA FRHistS
Cambridge Colleges – their designed landscape history
Dr Benson drew on Volume 7 of SAL’s Harley Collection, which shows a plan of seventeenth-century Cambridge’s layout and one of Oxford as well as etchings of the individual colleges and their grounds. All in one volume it was an effective way of comparing the two towns and their colleges in the seventeenth century. Also because several colleges of both towns developed from monasteries as a result of the Reformation, she also accessed SAL’s books on monasteries and their re-use – the SAL library holds several important works on monasteries.
Bramshill, Hampshire – the mystery of its botanical wainscotting
Ann used information from four articles in the near complete collection of Country Life at SAL and a hard to obtain book written by a twelve year old girl who lived at Bramshill in the 1930s. This book was pivotal in explaining the appearance of the paintings. Incidentally, having the Linnean Society virtually next door was convenient for Ann then accessing the editions of 16th-century herbals.
Dr Ann Benson is a writer and lecturer on Garden and Architectural History specializing in the Tudor and Stuart periods. Ann has published several research-based history books and peer-reviewed articles in these fields and is Beaufort Fellow at St John’s College, Cambridge where she is pursuing Leverhulme-funded research on the University’s colleges.
2pm: Lucy Beall Lott – ‘With Sorrow Thou came and with Sorrow shalt Wend Away’: Images of Parental Grief in the Wall Paintings of St. Stephen’s Chapel
This presentation examines the wall paintings of St Stephen’s Chapel created under the reign of Edward III. Lucy explores the possibility that the wall paintings may have been a reaction to the deaths of his two children, Joan, and William. She analysed the unusual inclusion of Joseph swaddling the Christ Child, an image with no known comparison in medieval England, as well as a receipt that demonstrated Joan’s clothes were reworked into vestments donated to the chapel by Edward with his own two hands. The latter she will use as evidence to suggest that the furthermost female member of Edward’s family depicted in the destroyed paintings, long thought of to be the youngest child, may in fact represent Joan.
Lucy Beall Lott is a first year PhD Candidate at the University of St Andrews. Her research examines the relationship between childhood and sanctity in medieval England and how this was expressed visually between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries. This project seeks to address evolving attitudes towards children during the long twelfth century which changed how childhood was viewed and treated in certain contexts, both spiritually and legally. Her thesis will explore how these developing perspectives affected art that commemorated children. Lucy earned her BA from The University of St Andrews, her MA from the Courtauld Institute of Art, and has recently earned her MPhil from the University of Cambridge.
2.30pm: Roey Sweet FSA – Final discussion and Q&A
Professor Roey Sweet will chair an audience led discussion and Q&A session about the Society and its collection, as well as Q&As to the other speakers who’ve talked during the day.
Professor Roey Sweet is professor of urban history at the Centre for Urban History, University of Leicester. Her research interests focus upon antiquarianism and the reception of the past and the histories of towns and urban culture during the long eighteenth century. Her study of antiquarian culture, Antiquaries: the Discovery of the Past in Eighteenth-Century Britain was published in 2004. She has also published on travel and antiquarianism, including Cities and the Grand Tour. The British in Italy, c. 1690-1820. She is currently working on two projects, one on the ‘invention’ of the historic town c. 1780-1850 and the other on British travel to Spain 1760-1830, focusing on Sir William Gell FSA (Leverhulme RPG 2020-194) in collaboration with the British School at Rome.
3pm: Ends
This event will be both in person at Burlington House and online. Please select the appropriate ticket below.
If you have any questions, please contact us on [email protected]