York Castle Museum

Object Identification

How we can help

Our curatorial team have a great deal of expertise about our own collections and are happy to help try and identify your objects. Across York Museums Trust, we cover a wide range of subjects including archaeology, biology, costume and textiles, decorative art, fine art, geology, military history and social history.

Please provide as much information about the object as you can, including, if possible, a detailed description, a photograph, and the exact location where it was found or bought. Regrettably, we cannot give advice on items for sale and cannot give valuations.

If you are enquiring about an object we own, that you have seen photographed or published, please try and provide as many details as you can about where you saw it.

To make an enquiry, please contact the most appropriate curator. Click here to meet our curatorial team. Please bear with us if you do not receive a reply straight away. We will get back to you as soon as possible but some enquiries do take up to a month.

Archaeology enquiries

Unfortunately our archaeology enquiry service has been suspended until 1 May, 2012, as our curators are busy working on future exhibitions.

This means all object enquiries, access for photography and research requests relating to archaeology are also suspended. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause and appreciate your patience during this busy period.

Meanwhile, the archaeological finds service run by the Portable Anquities Scheme is operating as normal - see below.

If you find an archaeological object

We are fortunate to have staff from the national Portable Antiquities Scheme based at the Yorkshire Museum who are happy to try and identify archaeological objects.

The scheme was set up in 1997 to record information about finds made by members of the public, many of whom are metal detector users. In return, the public get expert help in identifying their finds.

If you think you have found something interesting, come along to one of our Finds Days (see below), or contact Becky Morris at the Yorkshire Museum, on 01904 687668, or email rebecca.morris@ymt.org.uk

For more information about the Portable Antiquities Scheme, go to http://www.finds.org.uk

Finds Days, 2012

All 10am - 1pm, in the Yorkshire Museum reception area. Bring your archaeological object to show our experts.

Saturday, 4 February, 2012
Saturday, 7 April
Saturday, 2 June
Saturday, 4 August
Saturday, 6 October
Saturday, 1 December