A major exhibition now showing at Dublin's Chester Beatty showcases some of the finest treasures from Beatty’s priceless collection.
The event celebrates the 50th anniversary of Beatty’s death in 1968, when the collection was left in trust for the Irish people. 26 masterpieces, some thousands of years old and crafted for powerful rulers from Mughal emperors to Japanese warlords have been chosen to represent the breadth of the collection.
Items include tablets of jade, a prayer book that belonged to Philip II of Spain, the celebrated Yongle encyclopaedia commissioned in 1403 by the emperor to preserve all Chinese literature, Japanese scrolls and Buddhist art as well as the oldest surviving manuscript of the four gospels and famous Qur’ans for which the Chester Beatty is famous. The show runs until April 2019.
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Chester Beatty has also launched a new searchable database of 2,000 high-resolution digital images from the museum’s collections - new images will be added on a daily basis. Medieval manuscripts some thousands of years old, rare books, Japanese scrolls, Buddhist paintings and Jade tablets can now be viewed in glorious detail - images can be downloaded from the website for non-commercial use, free of charge.
To view the new website, go directly to the Chester Beatty Digital Collections viewer here.
