Thirty-Four Years Ago, a British Museum Staffer Stole 350 Prints in Broad Daylight. A New Book Chronicles the Thefts and Their Fallout

While seemingly unreported at the time, the pilfering was uncovered by historian Barnaby Phillips as a part of his analysis for a new guide about African treasures

Kunjal Bastola

– Editorial Intern

March 5, 2026

Nigel Peverett had labored at the British Museum in London since the early Seventies, however in April, 1992, he was caught leaving with round hundreds of {dollars} price of prints. When the inner and felony investigations had been completed, police discovered greater than 169 prints with Peverett, who additionally admitted to having stolen and offered an extra 150. 

At the time, the theft went seemingly unreported, however whereas researching for his new guide about stolen African treasures,The African Kingdom of Gold: Britain and the Asante Treasure, historian Barnaby Phillips uncovered data of the malfeasance in the museum’s personal archives.

“Peverett’s thefts were recorded by the museum after they came to light, and an effort was made to recover the stolen artworks,” experiences Harry Cockburn of The Independent. According to Phillips’ analysis, Peverett would generally go into the museum with one bag and come out with 4, utilizing razors to scrape off or minimize down the catalogue numbers earlier than promoting them by a supplier at the Portobello Road antiques market.

The museum recovered about 55 prints, and at the very least 95 stay unfound. Peverett acquired a suspended sentence for his crimes. In his guide, Philips recounts assembly Peverett’s household, who described Peverett as a “‘charming but feckless man, who loved art and classical music, but was ‘totally irresponsible and hopeless with money’, even once burning a Porsche in an insurance fraud scheme.” Peverett died in 2023, allegedly nonetheless receiving a museum pension.

“The British Museum probably hoped that the ‘extraordinary’ episode would remain undiscovered in its archives, Phillips claimed,” writes Fintan Hogan of The Times.

A spokesperson for the museum tells The Independent in an e-mail, “These events occurred decades ago and the individual was caught and prosecuted at the time. Thefts will unfortunately always be a risk for every museum and for this reason we take safeguarding the collection incredibly seriously.”

This incident was not the final suspected inside job that the British Museum encountered. In 2023, Art News reported on the British Museum’s plans to digitize 2.4 million data in response to discovering that 2,000 objects had been stolen, allegedly by a former senior curator of Greek and Hellenistic collections.

The thefts had been uncovered after Danish antiquities supplier, Ittai Gradel, seen that an historic gemstone referred to as the Priapus cameo was being offered on eBay. Gradel recalled seeing the object earlier than: in an outdated gems catalogue at the British Museum.

“There was no doubt it was the same object and I was confused,” he instructed BBC’s Katie Razzall, Larissa Kennelly and Darin Graham in 2024. The museum filed a civil lawsuit towards the former curator, who denies the allegations.