Tags
Bell, Bristol, Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery, Bronze, China, Chinese Bell, Chinese History, Museums, Museums and Galleries, tea.
To quote the Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery’s website:
“Where else can you order your food with a view of a 17th-century chimney piece from Lewins Mead and eat your food with your back to a huge 18th-century bronze Chinese bell while being overlooked by two stone lions as two floors above a dinosaur skeleton rears up on its hind legs?”
I did indeed eat my delicious chocolate muffin and drank my tea with my back to this “huge 18th century bronze Chinese bell” and enjoyed every minute of it, as did my sister and four year old nephew [in fact my nephew still refers to the Bristol City Museum as “The Cheese Museum” in reference to the soft cheese triangle he ate on the day this photograph was taken].
A Bristol based associate of mine remarked that it must have been incredibly difficult to remove from its original position, but I’m not so sure. The plaque attached to the bell describes how the bell was acquired by a Royal Navy officer in aftermath of the Taiping Rebellion and I wonder if the bell could be moved quite simply with the right application of man power and an adequate amount of rope (two things readily available on a Victorian man-of-war, I would have thought).
Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery is completely free, so why not pop in to have a look at the bell, as well as some of the other interesting exhibits and have a cup of tea like I did.
The Antics Roadshow blog 