The Hood Museum of Art has anthropological materials from both the New World and the Old World dating back to the Pleistocene Era (20,000 to 30,000 years ago) A mastodon tooth in the Hood’s collection that was found in North America dates to roughly the same period. The mastodon molar is not only one of the oldest objects in the Hood’s collection, but also one of the first objects acquired by the College for its collections, in 1772.
Also of note in the Hood collection are the famous Assyrian Reliefs, dating from the 8th century BCE, from the Northwest Palace of King Ashurnanasirpal II at Nimrud, Iraq. The reliefs, which depict a ritual performance undertaken by the king, were a gift to the College from Sir Henry Rawlinson in 1856.
The Rauner Special Collections Library, part of the Dartmouth College Library system, also holds a collection of rare items including Babylonian clay tablets dating to 1250 BCE, as well a leaf from a Gutenberg bible in its collection of rare books and manuscripts.
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