The British Museum is to receive the highest-value gift in UK museum history as it acquires £1billion worth of Chinese ceramics.
Some 1,700 pieces will be donated to the Boomsbury museum by trustees of the Sir Percival David Foundation, whose British businessman founder collected the pieces in Europe, Japan, Hong Kong and China.
The collection has been on loan to the museum since 2009 in the specially designed bilingual Room 95, with an online catalogue available to view across the world, as Sir Percival, who lived from 1892 to 1964, wanted his private collection to be used to inform and inspire people.
Director of the British Museum Dr Nicholas Cullinan said: "I am humbled by the generosity of the trustees of the Sir Percival David Foundation in permanently entrusting their incomparable private collection to the British Museum.
"These celebrated objects add a special dimension to our own collection and together offer scholars, researchers and visitors around the world the incredible opportunity to study and enjoy the very best examples of Chinese craftsmanship anywhere in existence."
The donation will bring the museum's collection of Chinese ceramics to 10,000 pieces, making it one of the most important collections of the ceramics of any public institution outside the Chinese-speaking world.
Chairman of The Sir Percival David Foundation, Colin Sheaf, said: "In every respect, this gift achieves the three objectives which most preoccupied Sir Percival as he planned for the collection's future.
"To preserve intact his unique collection, to keep every single piece on public display together in perpetuity in a dedicated gallery, and to ensure the collection would remain not only a visual display of surpassing beauty, but also an inspiration and education for future generations of academics, students and non-specialists alike."
After they are sent to the British Museum, pieces will be lent to the Shanghai Museum in China and Metropolitan Museum in New York.
Highlights from the collection include the David vases from 1351, which revolutionised the dating for blue and white ceramics with their discovery, and a chicken cup used to serve wine for the Chenghua emperor. It also includes Ru wares made for the Northern Song dynasty court around 1086.
Arts minister Sir Chris Bryant said: "Thanks to the huge generosity of the Sir Percival David Foundation, I am thrilled these world-famous Chinese ceramics will now be displayed permanently in the British Museum, where the collection will educate and enlighten future generations for many years to come.
"I am immensely grateful for this phenomenal act of generosity and very much hope it will help set a trend for others."
The final transfer of ownership to the British Museum is to be determined by the Charity Commission's consent.
Although a donation of this size to any UK museum is unprecedented, it is just one of a series acquired by the London institute this year, including The Revised Standard Edition of The Complete Psychological Works Of Sigmund Freud.
