By: Amy Ellsworth

A woman water pipe smoker “Kaliunchi” (‘nargilah’ in Arabic and Turkish) in a teahouse in Damghan, Semnan Province, Iran in 1932. Penn Museum Image #83371. Iran was an important part of the Silk Road trading routes. One of the many food items traded along the silk road was pistachios, a main export of Damghan. At […]

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By: Gabrielle Niu

During the height of the Silk Road and the bright beginnings of the Tang dynasty, China was ruled by one Emperor Tang Taizong. Taizong’s rule is remembered for its economic prosperity, cultural richness and cosmopolitanism, as well as for its unprecedented expansion of Chinese borders into the Western Xinjiang Regions. At the end of his life, he […]

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By: Josh

Victor Mair, Professor of Chinese Language and Literature at Penn, lends his expertise to this short documentary from National Geographic. Make sure to visit the Secrets of the Silk Road exhibit at the Penn Museum opening February 5th.

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By: Josh

We’re working around the clock to ready the debut of our Secrets of the Silk Road exhibition in two weeks. But who can work on an empty stomach? The Pepper Mill Café at the Penn Museum invites guests to take a culinary journey along the Silk Road. The Café offers a changing variety of regionally-inspired […]

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By: Amy Ellsworth

Since we started planning for Secrets of the Silk Road, almost every powerpoint presentation I’ve seen has been festooned with pictures of camels. We’ve spent many a coffee break needling over whether or not the camels peppering the latest powerpoint were Bactrians or Dromedaries. Bactrian camels have two humps! Surely, you knew that already. At […]

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By: Gabrielle Niu

The Penn Museum’s Exhibits Department has been developing the interactive features for the Secrets of the Silk Road exhibition opening February 5th! Watch this video for a sneak peek into the exhibition and click here to see photos of the department at work.

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By: Ardeth Abrams

Caption: Before, during, and after photos of our “flipped lab”. It wasn’t exactly like the show “Flip This House” but it was certainly fraught with emotional ups and downs as we waited for our new ceramics lab to be completed. There were many trips down the hall to the West Wing of the Museum to […]

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By: Amy Ellsworth

Many staff members here are geeking out about the Indiana Jones Exhibition opening in Montreal in April. Penn Museum will be loaning many of the real artifacts that will be on display in this exhibition. We are all giddy about seeing them in the context of such a classic movie. The Museum is always abuzz […]

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By: Pam Kosty

A group of archaeologists working in Armenia had something to toast in the new year: they announced that they had unearthed a surprisingly advanced winemaking operation, discovered in a cave hear a remote Armenian village. The operation dates back 6,000 years-making it the earliest known site in the world for wine-making with grapes! This exciting […]

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By: Amy Ellsworth

George Rawls (left) and a Bororo boy named Tari (right) during the Penn Museum’s Matto Grosso Expedition in Brasil, 1941 My former  archivist colleagues were charged with the task of scrubbing the Archives Image Database. Out of their own genuine love for the collection (and not due to a lack of work, mind you) they created […]

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