The British Museum is to receive Chinese ceramics worth £1 billion, in what is believed to be the largest donation received by a British museum.

The addition of the Sir Percival David Foundation objects will also make the museum’s stock of antiquities one of the largest outside the Chinese-speaking world.

Some of the donated objects date from the 3rd to the 20th century.

Museum director Dr Nicholas Cullinan said the objects would offer visitors and researchers “the incredible opportunity to study and appreciate the best examples of Chinese craftsmanship that exist”.