Welcome
Gathering the Jewels features over 30,000 images of objects, books, letters, aerial photographs and other items from museums, archives and libraries throughout Wales.
Search the map
New to Gathering the Jewels is G.I.S. A geographical search facility that will enable searching by location and place name.
Portrait of the geologist Henry Thomas de la Beche (1796-1855)
Henry Thomas de la Beche was a geologist who was active during the first half of the 19th century when the foundations of the new science of geology were being laid. Initially pursuing geology as a gentlemanly hobby, financial difficulties led him to work as a geologist for the Ordnance Survey. This led to the establishment in 1835 of what became the British Geological Survey, with de la Beche as its first Director. He also set up the Museum of Economic Geology (later the Geological Museum, and now part of the Natural History Museum, London), the Royal School of Mines, and the Mining Record Office. The National Museum of Wales holds an extensive archive of de la Beche's letters, drawings, notebooks and photographs.
