Egyptology

© Petrie photographing on excavation (Margaret Murray's photograph album, Abydos 1902). Petrie Museum archive PMF/ WFP1/115/5/2).  

Archives relating to Egyptology at UCL are predominantly held at the Petrie Museum of Ancient Egypt. The museum holds letters, diaries, tomb registers, excavation records, photos and many more materials relating to the museum, the department of Egyptology at UCL, and its leading figures, including William Matthew Flinders Petrie (1853-1942) and Margaret Murray (1863-1963). 

To consult the archives, please consult the museum direct: museums@ucl.ac.uk. 

UCL Special Collections is one of the foremost university collections of manuscripts, archives and rare books in the UK. Our holdings span the 4th century to the present day and cover a vaste range of subject areas and disciplines. The strengths of the collections include language, literature and poetry from the 15th to the 21st centuries, 20th and 21st century small-press publishing, politics and social policy, History of Science, Mathematics, Latin American history and economics, Hebraica and Judaica, Education, the history of London and the history of UCL.

Anyone with a need to consult our collections is welcome to do so. UCL Special Collections is reference only. It is essential to book in advance to make sure of a reading room place and that the items requested are available. Please contact us at least two weeks before you intend to visit. Unfortunately, we are not able to accommodate drop-in visits.

Search the catalogues for collections held across:

• UCL Special Collections comprising UCL Archives, UCL Records and the Institute of Education (IOE);
• School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES);
• Queen Square Archives comprising the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery (UCLH) and UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology.

• Digital Collections

  UCL Digital Collections is home to the Library's digitised materials and research data. You can search the collections, or browse an overview of all our holdings.

• The Xia Nai Index of Egyptian Beads 

There are some 3000 strings of beads in the Petrie Museum. These formed the subject of a dissertation in the 1940s by Xia Nai, one of China's leading archaeologists and pioneers after the founding of the People's Republic in 1949. Scans of his 1760 index cards held in the Petrie Museum archives, are available through UCL Digital Collections.