Usually, if you are simply searching for an object, you should be able to find what you're looking for by entering sensible keywords in the Object Name search field.
If you are searching for a specific object based on its accession number this search can be performed by using the Museum Number field. Simply prefix your search query with "ACC:". This will run a stricter search purely on the accession number field of each object, and will return the object with that exact number.
example: ACC: X.1828
If you cannot find what you're after using the object name search box, you might be able to find it using some of the other search options. You can search for an object by its exact name, or use wildcards (*) to broaden your search.
example: entering Cat* in the Object Name field will return all objects with 'cat', 'catch' etc in the title, and *Top will return 'Humming Top', 'Seal Top' etc. Wildcards can also be used when entering text in the Artist / Maker field. Please note that this field searches by surname only.
When searching by Date, you may enter a year in either the From field, the To field, or both. Please do so by entering a year in YYYY format.
At the bottom of the form you may choose to search using AND or OR. This only has any affect if you fill out more than one field in the advanced search form, and determines whether all the search terms must be satisfied (when using AND) or any of the search terms are satisfied (using OR). Using AND on too many fields may limit your results considerably, however OR has the opposite affect and may result in slow queries.