Centenary Gallery
Artefacts from cultures and civilisations around the world tell the story of the Horniman's collections.
Centenary Gallery
More than 1,000 artefacts from cultures and civilisations across the world are on display in our Centenary Gallery.
The gallery tells the story of the Hornimans collections and how they were viewed by different collectors over the last 100 years. The exhibition includes beautiful and diverse objects collected by many people including amateur enthusiasts like Frederick Horniman, academic anthropologists such as Alfred Cort Haddon, the Museum's first advisory curator and recent anthropology curators who have collected from places such as Nigeria, the American Southwest and Nepal.
Highlights include a dramatic papier maché figure of Kali from Calcutta collected in 1894, a death dance mask in the shape of a crocodile from the Torres Strait Islands and Annang puppets from Nigeria depicting the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana.
Perhaps the most intriguing exhibit is the torture chair. One of Frederick Hornimans original purchases, it was reputed to have been used in a dungeon in Cuenca in Spain in the 17th century. We now know that although many components are genuine the chair was greatly added to in the 19th century to feed the Victorians' interest in gruesome historical displays.