Digital Lab Blog

This blog aims to highlight artefacts, stories, histories, and relationships from the collections at MAA. Each post begins with an object or a collection at MAA and explores wider themes including substances of wellbeing and intoxication, process of making, mending, and conservation, digitisation and more!

Explore the most recent blog posts below or use the dropdown menu to filter posts by category. For more stories on collections from across the MAA and the wider University Cambridge Museums consortium, head to the University of Cambridge Museums blog.

Looking After a 22nd Dynasty Egyptian Bead Net

A brief insight into the conservation of an impressive 22nd Dynasty Egyptian bead net which was carefully removed from a Perspex board and bead by bead, sewn to a more suitable, acid free backing.

Katerina Theodoraki

28 March 2023

A sample of loose leaf ‘Russian tea’

A small sample of loose-leaf tea raises more questions than can be answered: is it Queen Mary tea or Russian? Was it produced in Britain, Russia, or as the catalogue record suggests, in Tibet?

Aayushi Gupta

21 March 2023

Roman Wine in a Cambridgeshire Grave

A chance discovery of a grave led to the most important Iron Age find in Cambridgeshire for years. Discover more about wine amphorae, grave goods, and what they can tell us about Iron Age Europe.

Caitlin Brooker

14 March 2023

Dragons, Monk’s Caps, and Butter Tea: The Duomuhu

What can drinking vessels tell us about historical changes and relationships? I explore the trajectory of one such vessel, a 多穆壶 (duomuhu), and what it tells us about the politics of the Chinese Empire.

Rui En Pok (Rae)

7 March 2023

Preserving and Revitalising 昆曲 (Kunqu Opera) on the World Stage

Kunqu Opera, one of the oldest forms of Chinese opera, was at one point threatened with extinction. Explore stories of its revival through several collections-based projects at MAA.

Zilan Wang

21 February 2023

Chinese New Year or Lunar New Year? – Celebrating in Harmony

Chinese New Year' or 'Lunar New Year' are two intertwined terms. Although indicative of positive cultural change, their overlapping nature has sparked controversies within museum spaces.

Zilan Wang

14 February 2023

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