Towneley from A to Z
Towneley from A to Z
Apart from the Egyptology collection, there was local prehistoric material on display from 1908, when stone implements from Worsthorne Moor were donated. There were several other gifts of flint implements but much was of limited value as their origins were uncertain. Inventories as late as 1938 recorded all stone material together including fossils, worked flint, minerals and shells as fossils.
The display and interpretation of local prehistoric material improved in the 1950s. The Burnley Local History Society conducted in an excavation at Mosley Height Burial Circle in 1950 and the finds were presented to the Museum. In 1952, Isaac Magson of Littleborough, a brass founder by trade, bequeathe a carefully catalogued collection of over 1,000 flint implements found on the local moors over a period of more than 40 years.
The room that is now the Military Room was in 1931 the Antiquities Room and displayed part of the Egyptology collection. In 1975 it became the Prehistory Room, displaying local flint tools and prehistoric pottery until 2001. Since 2002 the have been occassional small displays of local prehistoric material but nothing to compare with that described in the museum's 1984 guide book
The flints show the types of tools used by men in the Burnley district in the Middle Stone Age or 'Mesolithic' period (from 6,000-3,000 BC), the New Stone Age or 'Neolithic' period (from 3,500-2,000 BC), and the Bronze Age (from 2,000-500 BC). During these years the woodlands which covered the high ground around Burnley were slowly cleared and men ceased being hunter-food gatherers searching for what they could find to eat. Instead, agriculture developed and the first settlements were built in the Pennines. Of particular importance are the urns from various burials in the area, especially those from the Mosley Height Burial Circle which was found and excavated by the Burnley Local History Society in 1950. The urns contained the cremated bones of Bronze Age leaders from the district, some of which are on show.
As of 2016 there has been nothing added to the accession registers or the Modes database.