With an impressive array of items ranging from sculptures and tile mosaics to ancient coins and jewellery and video accompaniment to offer an insight into the history and culture of the regions, the ROM's collection stands alongside those at any other museum.
ROM director and CEO Janet Carding noted that the new galleries, like all such historic exhibits, do more than offer insight into the past, serving as a link to the present as well.
"They allow us to think about who we are today, who we've become," she said.
Carding noted the galleries will offer some item descriptions in Braille as well as tactile sculptures for the visually impaired, though the latter are popular exhibit features for all museum-goers.
"We find everybody enjoys experiencing the collection this way," she said. "Everybody wants to hold a piece of history."
The new galleries were made possible through $2.75 million in funding from the federal government, a figure matched by the ROM, as well as through generous donations made by longtime museum supporters Joey and Toby Tanenbaum, Thor and Nicole Eaton and Rudolph Bratty.
Paul Denis, an assistant curator at the ROM, pointed out some unique features of the new galleries, including a limestone ciborium that was used to cover altars in Byzantium.
Denis said the ciborium, donated by Joey and Toby Tanenbaum, dates from between 500 and 600 A.D. and may be the only one of its kind in the world.
"It comes from a region of ancient Syria, Palestine and the churches were plundered there," he said. "I don't know that you'll find one of these in this condition anywhere."
He added that a large tile mosaic is also amazing given its condition.
"With its size and rarity, it would be impossible to get something like that today," he said.
Dr. Krzysztof Grzymski, vice president and senior curator of the ROM's world cultures department, said the collection showcases the initiative of the museum's first ever director, Charles Currelly.
Currelly himself purchased some of the pieces on display and was responsible for excavation missions in untapped regions such as Sudan, which were overlooked by many archaeologists around the start of the 20th century.
"The gallery shows the direct results of our field work," he said.
The new galleries are located on the third floor of the Royal Ontario Museum.
Source: Inside Toronto [June 30, 2011]