The long-rumoured existence of a so-called 'nutter rota', operated at the British Museum's Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan, appears to have been confirmed during our investigation of the recent strike amongst junior curatorial staff there. For many years, stories have circulated about the rota, while the official line - that it is a mere fanciful myth - had always been maintained by the Museum's senior staff. As the current strike action among junior employees rumbles on, though, one young curator has revealed not only that the rota exists, but also that it is at the centre of the disagreement.

David Lyndsay-Fynn told us: 'Yes, the nutter rota exists. When the bell on the door linking us to the public galleries goes, it's not just the closest person to it that goes to meet what we call 'the great unwashed'. There's a rota, and I'm on it almost every morning. The rota isn't written down anywhere, but it's communicated to us orally at our weekly departmental meetings.' Asked why the duty was considered so onerous, Lyndsay-Fynn was also able to confirm the truth of a number of other stories that had once been thought to be either apocryphal or at least grossly exaggerated. 'The woman who thinks she's carrying the unborn child of a reanimated Ramesses the Great is bad enough', he claimed, 'but when you get the guy who thinks his dog is possessed by the spirit of Osiris and is shitting out people's souls, one does wonder if this is why one came to work here'.

He added: 'The guy actually brings the shits with him in little plastic bags.'

Share this on facebook | Tweet this