2. British Museum
The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections,
which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in
the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture
from its beginnings to the present.
位於倫敦的大英博物館收藏著關於人類歷史和文化的文物。它擁有超過七百萬件館藏，其
收藏品項和數量是世上最多的，並來自世界各地；這些館藏也紀錄、乘載著人類由始至今的文
化。
The British Museum was established in 1753, largely based on the collections of the physician
and scientist Sir Hans Sloane. The museum first opened to the public on January 15, 1759 in
Montagu House in Bloomsbury, on the site of the current museum building. Its expansion over the
following two and a half centuries was largely a result of an expanding British colonial footprint and
has resulted in the creation of several branch institutions, the first being the British Museum (Natural
History) in South Kensington in 1887. Some objects in the collection, most notably the Elgin
Marbles from the Parthenon, are the objects of intense controversy and of calls for restitution to their
countries of origin.
大英博物館於 1753 年完工，大部分的早期館藏都是由身兼醫師和科學家的漢斯．斯隆所
捐贈。大英博物館的前身為位在布盧姆斯伯里區的蒙塔古故居，博物館首度於 1759 年的一月
十五日對外開放。在之後兩個半世紀，隨著英國殖民的足跡擴張，大英博物館也開始設立分館。
第一個分館是在 1887 年於倫敦南肯辛頓設立的自然歷史博物館。其中最具爭議的館藏莫過於
來自帕德嫩神廟的額爾金大理石，這件文物招來許多非議，因此有將它還給原產國的呼聲。
Until 1997, when the British Library moved to a new site, the British Museum was unique in
that it housed both a national museum of antiquities and a national library in the same building. The
museum is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and
Sport, and as with all other national museums in the United Kingdom it charges no admission fee.
Since 2002 the director of the museum has been Neil MacGregor.
1997 年，大英圖書館遷移至新址前，大英博物館的獨特之處在於同一棟建築內同時設置
國家文物博物館和國家圖書館。博物館是非政府部門公共機構，由文化傳媒和體育部此一政府
部門贊助營運，和其他英國國立博物館一樣，供免費入場。自 2002 年以來，館長一直為尼爾．
麥格雷戈。
Although principally a museum of cultural art objects and antiquities today, the British Museum
was founded as a "universal museum". Its foundations lie in the will of the physician and naturalist
Sir Hans Sloane (1660–1753). During the course of his lifetime Sloane gathered an enviable
collection of curiosities and, not wishing to see his collection broken up after death, he bequeathed it
to King George II, for the nation, for the princely sum of £20,000.
雖然今天普遍認為大英博物館是以文化藝術品和古文物為主，但最初設立時是定位為「綜
合博物館」。它是依照醫生兼博物學家－漢斯．斯隆（1660－1753）的意志所建造而成。
不希望這些他生前搜集的珍品在死後遭人破壞，於是他將價值約 20,000 英鎊的收藏品捐
給當時的國王喬治二世。