For a million years the sound of making handaxes provided the percussion of everyday life. Anyone choosing a hundred objects to tell a history of the world would have to include a handaxe.

Objects let you tell a narrative that encompasses everybody. Texts don't.

[The Persian Empire] left a dream of the Middle East as a unit, and a unit where people of different faiths could live together.

For many, the icon of the British Museum is the Rosetta Stone, that administrative by-product of the Greek imperial adventure in Africa.

For a million years the sound of making handaxes provided the percussion of everyday life. Anyone choosing a hundred objects to tell a history of the world would have to include a handaxe.

Objects are better than text at conveying narrative

From the point where our ancestors started making tools, people have been unable to survive without the things they make; in this sense, it is making things that makes us human.