Curator Tour: Unearthed Exhibition, Museum of Sydney

Join Museums of History NSW (MHNSW) Research Manager and curator, Dr Aaron de Souza, for an ASHA members tour of Unearthed at the Museum of Sydney.

The tour is scheduled for Tuesday 13 January 2026, from 9:50am - 11am AEDT.

Unearthed displays artefacts excavated from the site of the first Government House, built in 1788-89 for Governor Arthur Phillip. The exhibition explores the tangible and intangible histories embodied in the finds and sheds light on the people who lived and worked at the property, and those whose lives were impacted by decisions made within its walls. Unearthed also showcases the people behind the excavations, many of whom are key figures in Australian historical archaeology today.

Dr Aaron de Souza is Research Manager at MHNSW and the curator of Unearthed. Before joining MHNSW, Aaron was a Research Fellow at the Austrian Archaeological Institute in Vienna, where he held a prestigious Marie Sklodowska-Curie fellowship from the European Commission, and Lise Meitner Research fellowship from the Austrian Science Fund. He has worked on numerous sites across Egypt and has published widely on his specialist subject of ancient Nubian material culture. 

Image: Montage of candid photographs from the 1983–84 and 1990–91 excavations at the first Government House site. Courtesy Museum of History NSW.