Fossils, palaeolithic tools, pottery shards and outmoded domestic objects were among the artefacts on show in an exhibition hosted by the Bharathi Matriculation Higher Secondary School at its campus in K.K. Nagar on Wednesday.
Showcasing antiquities gathered over several years by amateur collectors, the exhibition also included a section on numismatics and philately.
“Allowing children to see these rare objects will help them to understand our history and culture beyond what they learn in a textbook,” K. Balakrishnan, the school’s principal, told The Hindu . Most of the archaeological samples belong to the collection of A. Periyasami, a self-taught history enthusiast from Pachamalai area, who has been finding and cataloguing the objects on his own initiative since his school days.
Students were seen pointing out excitedly to things like coin-boxes, wooden toys and wind-up clocks that are no longer in use today.
Among the objects on show are bangles made of sea shell, animal horn and black stone, and part of a mud furnace used to smelt iron. “Most of the red and black terracotta pottery shards are actually funerary treasures. Much like the Egyptians, Megalithic communities in Tamil Nadu followed the practice of burying possessions of the deceased person in the same grave, because they believed that they would be useful in the afterlife,” said Mr. Balakrishnan. The school official also has a small selection of meteorite samples that have been certified and analysed for their metallic content by professional agencies.
