Lincolnshire’s Great Exhibition celebrates a wonderful county!

There are treasures galore in Lincoln this summer as the city hosts a sumptuous exhibition to coincide with the Magna Carta 800th celebrations.

Lincolnshire’s Great Exhibition, which opened at the weekend, is a unique opportunity to see loan exhibits ranging from paintings, watercolours and etchings, to maps, illuminated manuscripts, and letters, as well as racing trophies, seals, ceremonial artefacts and carvings.

The Historic Lincoln Trust has worked closely with Lincoln Cathedral and Lincolnshire County Council on the exhibition, and amongst the magnificent treasures, they are particularly delighted to have two stunning loans on display. In partnership with the British Library, the exhibition is displaying the Luttrell Psalter, a superb example of a fourteenth century English illuminated manuscript, and the Victoria and Albert Museum has loaned the Heneage Jewel, given by Queen Elizabeth I to Sir Thomas Heneage.

Jeff James, Honorary Curator and Chief Executive and Keeper of The National Archives said:

“The National Archives is the guardian of some of our most iconic national documents, including the 1225 Magna Carta. One of our priorities is to make our Collection as accessible as possible and we are delighted to loan the Magna Carta to the exhibition in Lincoln along with the 1804 Flinders map of Australia, the seal of Archbishop Langton, and the 15th century Pinchbeck Fen map.”

All the items in the exhibition have a connection with Lincolnshire in some way, and celebrate the county’s influence in Britain and further afield. Connections are evident through the subject matter such as famous people from the county, buildings or places, or the artists who created the works; the locations of collections, or through family ties. The earliest items date from the 1090s, and through the centuries to the 1990s. The exhibition includes a focus on great Lincolnshire figures from Gilbert of Sempringham, who founded the only English monastic order in Lincolnshire in the 12th century, to Margaret Thatcher, the first, and to date, the only woman Prime Minister in Britain. Other famous Lincolnshire figures such as Sir Isaac Newton, George Boole, John Wesley and Alfred, Lord Tennyson are represented, along with Lincolnshire explorers, Sir Joseph Banks, George Bass and Mathew Flinders.

The National Archives’ loan of a 1225 copy of Magna Carta sits alongside Lincoln Cathedral’s 1215 Magna Carta in the new David PJ Ross Magna Carta Vault at the castle, for the duration of the exhibition. There are portraits loaned from the National Portrait Gallery and private collections, as well as a room dedicated to Stubbs in the Usher Gallery. Other loans include paintings of Lincoln and Lincolnshire landscapes by Turner, Girtin and De Wint, an Episcopal Seal of St Hugh of Avalon, the Louth Panorama, an Astrolabe on loan from Spalding Gentlemen’s Society, explorer Franklin’s pocket watch and compass loaned by the National Maritime Museum, miniatures from Burghley House, and the 1804 Flinders Map of Australia.

The exhibition, displaying around 150 loan exhibits, takes place across four venues in the city, and runs until 27th September. Visitors have the opportunity to see the exhibition located across the Usher Gallery, The Collection, the Medieval and Wren Libraries in Lincoln Cathedral, and at Lincoln Castle.

The Historic Lincoln Trust gratefully acknowledges the support and invaluable contribution of all the lenders, the honorary curators – Dr Alan Borg, Jeff James and Oliver Morley, members of the exhibition advisory panel, sponsors, private donors, and staff from the Cathedral and Lincolnshire County Council in the realisation of this exhibition.

Principal sponsor – David Ross Foundation

Sponsors – Lindum, Siemens, Macquarie University, Australia