Ancient CyprusAncient Cyprus

Curator · Cataloguer · Scholar

David Symons

fl. 1980–1999 · United Kingdom

Birmingham museum curator who catalogued Wolverhampton's Cypriot antiquities, wrote the 1981-85 Archaeological Reports survey of Cyprus and traced the dispersed collection of Rupert Gunnis.

Biography

David Symons catalogued British museum holdings of Cypriot antiquities for the Corpus of Cypriote Antiquities and was Curator of Antiquities in Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery by 20016. His volume on Wolverhampton Art Gallery and Museums (1984) covers 59 pieces given by Thomas Brassey on 18 April 1888. Symons judged 29 of them certainly, 27 probably and 3 possibly from Kourion, Ayios Ermoyenis, while noting that Lady Brassey also obtained material elsewhere1,6. Two RDAC articles of 1985 followed, one on Cypriot vases in Britain and one, with R. Morris, on four figured-style vases in Birmingham9. For Archaeological Reports he compiled "Archaeology in Cyprus, 1981-85"4.

His 1987 article on Rupert Gunnis reconstructed a collection that Gunnis sold to the Wellcome collection on 30 August 1933 and that was dispersed in 1981, mainly to Birmingham, with single pieces to six other museums. About 200 pieces had been identified, and Symons was then cataloguing the Wellcome Cypriot material for the Corpus5.

Life and work

  1. 1981–1985
    Compiled 'Archaeology in Cyprus, 1981-85' for Archaeological Reports 33 (1986-87), condensing the excavation and museum acquisition information from Karageorghis's annual reports to the Bulletin de Correspondance Hellenique, with photographs from Karageorghis, R. J. A. Wilson, E. J. Peltenburg and F. G. Maier.

    Symons 1986-1987

  2. 1984
    Published the Corpus of Cypriote Antiquities (SIMA XX:10) volume on the Cypriot antiquities in Wolverhampton Art Gallery and Museums; it includes the 59 pieces presented by Thomas Brassey on 18 April 1888, of which Symons found 29 certainly, 27 probably and 3 possibly identifiable, and which he thought came from Kourion-Ayios Ermoyenis (with the caveat that Lady Brassey also got material from other sources).

    Gothenburg / WolverhamptonTaylor 2001, pp. 243-244Hermary 1986Csornay-Caprez 2000

  3. 1985
    Co-published with R. Morris 'Four figured style vases from Cyprus in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery' (RDAC 1985, 185-191); also 'Some Cypriot vases in Britain' (RDAC 1985).

    BirminghamKiely 2017

  4. 1985
    Thanked by Desmond Morris among those who helped with research for The Art of Ancient Cyprus (precise help not stated).

    Morris 1985

  5. 1987
    Published 'Rupert Gunnis (1899-1965)' in CCEC 7 at the suggestion of O. Masson. He reconstructed Gunnis's collection, sold to Sir Henry Wellcome on 30 August 1933 and dispersed after the Wellcome Trustees' 1981 decision, mainly to Birmingham City Museum and Art Gallery plus single pieces to the Ashmolean, Bristol, Hunterian, Royal Scottish Museum, Manchester and Liverpool; about 200 pieces firmly identified; and he stated he was cataloguing the Wellcome Cypriot material for the SIMA Corpus.

    BirminghamSymons 1987, pp. 5, n. 17

Connections

5 people
Rupert Forbes GunnisAnna (Annie) Brassey, Bar…Henry WellcomeDesmond MorrisPamela MagrillDavid Symons
ScholarshipColleagues

Scholarship

Colleagues & contacts

Sources

  1. 1.D. Symons (1984). Cypriote Antiquities in Wolverhampton Art Gallery and Museums. Göteborg, Paul Åströms Förlag.
  2. 2.D. Symons (1985). “Some Cypriot vases in Britain”. Report of the Department of Antiquities, Cyprus, 180-184.
  3. 3.R. Morris, D. Symons (1985). “Four figured style vases from Cyprus in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery”. Report of the Department of Antiquities, Cyprus, 185-191.
  4. 4.D. J. Symons (1986-1987). “Archaeology in Cyprus, 1981-85”. Archaeological Reports 33, 62-77.
  5. 5.D. Symons (1987). “Rupert Gunnis (1899-1965)”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 7, 3-9. Online
  6. 6.Lou Taylor (2001). “Lady Brassey, 1870-1886: traveller, writer, collector, educator, woman of means and the fate of her Cypriot artefacts”. Cyprus in the 19th Century AD: Fact, Fancy and Fiction, 239-247. Oxford, Oxbow.
  7. 7.Antoine Hermary (1986). “Chronique d'archéologie chypriote (1984-1985)”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 5.
  8. 8.Boldizsár Csornay-Caprez (2000). Cypriote Antiquities. Rome, L'Erma di Bretschneider.
  9. 9.T. Kiely (2017). “Britain and the archaeology of Cyprus II: 1914 to the present day”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 47, 253-310. Online
  10. 10.Desmond Morris (1985). The Art of Ancient Cyprus, with a check-list of the author's collection. Oxford, Phaidon Press in association with Jonathan Cape.