The Museum Built by Chance

The calculator reconstructs only the original 1567 proposal: 400,000 tickets at ten shillings (£0.50), with one proposed £5,000 top prize. For t distinct tickets, the top-prize chance is t/400,000. The eventual 1569 scheme changed. A full expected return cannot be recovered from these inputs; no inflation conversion is implied.

P(proposed top prize) = t / 400000; proposed gross = 400000 × £0.50

• Elizabeth I · letter, 31 August 1567
• The National Archives · IR 55/30 (1746)
• British Museum · For the curious and interested
• John Ashton · A History of English Lotteries (1893)

Lotteries financed public projects as well as private dreams. These three objects connect a royal fundraising proposal, government borrowing and the purchase of a national collection. Read each source on its own terms: a proposal is not a realised sale, and an annuity is not an immediate cash prize.

• Elizabeth I · letter, 31 August 1567
• The National Archives · IR 55/30 (1746)
• British Museum · For the curious and interested
• John Ashton · A History of English Lotteries (1893)