I have earlier commented on the acquisition of the head of Nefertiti from Amarna. The head was the main subject of a meeting of the Egyptian National Committee for the Return of Stolen Artifacts this week. Zahi Hawass notes that the session "discuss[ed] the procedures needed to make a formal request for the return of the Bust of Nefertiti now on display at the Neues Museum in Berlin".Earlier this month Dr. Seyfried met with Dr. Hawass and presented him with copies of all of the key documentation held by the Berlin Museum concerning this iconic piece. This includes the protocol of 20 January, 1913, written by Gustav Lefébvre, the official who signed the division of finds on behalf of the Egyptian Antiquities Service, and excerpts from the diary of Ludwig Borchardt, the excavator of the Bust.The case was made in an earlier report about Hawass' visit to Berlin:
Dr. Seyfried presented Dr. Hawass with copies of all of the key documentation held by the Berlin Museum concerning this iconic piece. This includes the protocol of January 20, 1913, written by Gustave Lefevre, the official who signed the division of finds on behalf of the Egyptian Antiquities Service, as well as excerpts from the diary of Ludwig Borchardt, the excavator of the piece. These materials confirm Egypt’s contention that Borchardt did act unethically, with intent to deceive: the limestone head of the queen is listed on the protocol as a painted plaster bust of a princess. Borchardt knew, as his diary shows, that this was the queen herself; he also knew that the head was of limestone covered with plaster and painted, not simply of plaster, as this was clearly visible through inspection of the piece itself. It seems that there was an agreement between Borchardt and Lefevre that all the plaster pieces (which included an important group of plaster masks of the royal family at Amarna) would go to Berlin, and this appears to have been one way that Borchardt misled Lefevre to ensure that the bust would also go to Berlin.
The spirit of support and cooperation emphasized in the MOU would be much better served if American museums could acquire redundant antiquities and borrow objects for long-term loan from Italian museums. AAMD believes that the United States government should encourage developed countries, such as Italy, to make redundant antiquities available to the legitimate market as a way to curtail looting.What are these "redundant antiquities"?
Nevertheless, the cumulative effect of the patrimony claims has been to chill the overall appetite of U.S. market participants for new acquisitions to the point that, unless the present trend is reversed, the long term viability of the U.S. antiquities market may be in doubt. This chilling effect extends not only to the high-end of the antiquities market, where the market value of an acquisition can justify the legal costs of a patrimony claim, but to the great majority of redundant antiquities that lack special archeological, historical, or cultural significance to any particular source nation.What did Pearlstein have in mind? And what does Feldman consider to be in this category?
Matt Bradley has written about Zahi Hawass' claims for the return of cultural property from European and North American museums (Matt Bradley, "Indiana Jones, but in reverse", The National December 19. 2009). Bradley anticipates the 2010 conference that is expected to have representations from 12 different countries (including China, Greece, Italy, and Mexico). An earlier Reuters interview is cited where Hawass restated his desire for the Rosette Stone to be returned to Egypt. The Principle of the Dangerous Precedent is that you should not now do an admittedly right action for fear you, or your equally timid successors, should not have the courage to do right in some future case, which, ex hypothesi, is essentially different, but superficially resembles the present one. Every public action which is not customary, either is wrong, or, if it is right, is a dangerous precedent. It follows that nothing should ever be done for the first time.Should Cornford be required reading for archaeological ethicists and museum curators?
I did not write yet to the British Museum but I will. I will tell them that we need the Rosetta Stone to come back to Egypt for good ... The British Museum has hundreds of thousands of artefacts in the basement and as exhibits. I am only needing one piece to come back, the Rosetta Stone. It is an icon of our Egyptian identity and its homeland should be Egypt.He seems to have moved his position from his earlier request of a loan for the opening of the Giza Museum in 2012. Reuters commented that Hawass "would no longer settle for just a loan".
The whole issue for the British Museum is if they say we're going to give you back the Rosetta Stone, it sets a precedent.The case for the universal museum displaying objects from world cultures was made in an interview with a tourist from Japan:
It is easy to travel here especially for tourists compared to travelling to Egypt. And that makes it open to everybody.The British Museum issued a short statement last week in connection with Hawass' visit to the Museum:
The current situation with regard to the Rosetta Stone is that the Museum has received a request from the Supreme Council of Antiquities requesting the short term loan of the stone for the opening of the new museum in Giza in 2012 or 2013. The Trustees of the British Museum will consider this request in due course.
The British Museum exists to tell the story of cultural achievement throughout the world, from two million years ago to the present. The Museum is a unique resource for the world: the breadth and depth of the collection allows a wide public to re-examine cultural identities and explore the complex network of interconnected human cultures. The Trustees feel strongly that the collection must remain as a whole in order for the Museum to continue to fulfil this purpose.
"To those who believe antiquities must be repatriated to the land that created them it is all about honouring context and respecting national identity."First, archaeological objects can be understood when they are retrieved from archaeological contexts in a scientific manner. Second, archaeological objects lose their contextual information when looted. Third, recently looted archaeological objects should be returned to the country from which they had been looted. Thus the Athenian Euphronios / Sarpedon krater was not returned to Greece but rather to Italy because it appears to have been snatched from an Etruscan tomb.
"worldclass museums protest that they exist to promote scholarship and cultural understanding far beyond the narrow confines of their own national borders."But one of the things that we can learn from the returns to Italy is that several "worldclass museums" in North America were more keen to acquire than to put in place ethical acquisition policies.
"The French looted far more from their fellow Europeans than from the Egyptians."Indeed Stewart cites the bronze horses of San Marco in Venice as examples of material "stolen" by Venetians from Constantinople.
ought the British to demand that the Russian National Library returns its copy of the 8th century manuscript of the Ecclesiastical History of the English People by the Venerable Bede? The key work by the father of English history could hardly be of greater significance to the country of its origin. Yet, that it exists at all may be precisely because a Russian diplomat, Peter Dubrovsky, removed it from Paris during the French Revolution, fearing it was not safe in a city being plundered by Jacobin mobs.Stewart states that the Northumbrian Bede should remain in St Petersburg. There is an implicit statement about the Rosetta Stone and the Parthenon marbles.
... Taken to its logical conclusion, every significant cultural artefact from another country currently housed in the British Museum would have to be repatriated. But how dull, then, if our country boasted only its own heritage and culture. Surely part of living in the global village is learning to share and value each other's art and history? ...But is Egypt asking for the emptying of all the Egyptian sculpture galleries in the British Museum, or asking for the loan of a single, unique document that is iconic for the study of Egyptology?
When we had all finished, I was pleased to note that the speakers representing museums generally praised the cooperation of their Italian counterparts in efforts to arrange loans to American institutions. It is clear that museums in this country would like to display Italian objects for longer periods than is currently possible, which seems to be a reasonable request. Only one museum representative, from the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, seemed to question the premise that it is appropriate to use the MoU to restrict import of antiquities from Italy with the goal of protecting sites and preserving information on the context of ancient art.No doubt the Minneapolis Institute of Arts is wanting to deflect interest from the Athenian red-figured volute-krater that was reportedly acquired from Robin Symes.
Tompa asserted that "Italy has done a poor job taking care of the coins at state institutions and archaeological sites".Now we can read the perspective of the AIA representative:
Another voice heard at the CPAC meeting was that of ancient coin collectors and dealers. Like many AIA members, one of the areas in which I’ve published scholarly articles is ancient numismatics so the protection of coins is of great interest to me. Archaeologists are members of the numismatic community, and it is important that our voice is heard. Speaking for coin dealers, Peter Tompa, who represented both the International Association of Professional Numismatists and the Professional Numismatists Guild and who has also released a summary of his written submission, suggested that Italian museums are not good stewards of their numismatic collections and that Italian archaeologists do a poor job publishing excavated coins. My experience suggests that neither is the case. The Palazzo Massimo in Rome has a superb numismatic display that features excavated material, including hoard finds, to trace the rise and use of coinage from the Republican period onwards. The website www.fastionline.org reports the discovery of coins and often places them in context by discussing the sites on which they were found. Unfortunately, the current MoU does not include coins as a protected category. If Italy does request that coins be included in a future agreement, it is likely that the AIA would support such a move.Heath seems to suggest that Tompa was either deliberately presenting misleading information to CPAC or was unaware of the true situation in Italy. Such a conclusion is surprising given that Tompa is a director of the Cultural Property Research Institute (CPRI). What does Tompa's presentation say about the quality of the "research" that is likely to be produced by the CPRI? (For earlier reservations see here.)
Today's news that two antiquities had been handed over to the Italian authorities is a reminder of the continuing issue of toxic antiquities. The Corinthian krater had apparently been handled by Giacomo Medici and had then surfaced on the market in 1985 through Sotheby's in London ("ICE returns stolen artifacts to Italy", ICE December 2, 2009).
Two antiquities that had been due to be auctioned in New York in June this year have been handed over to Italian officials ("Looted artifacts being returned to Italy from NYC", AP December 2009). One was a fragment of Roman wall-painting that had been found at Boscoreale (see earlier comments). Five other fragments from the same series have also been recovered from other locations. The other piece is a Corinthian krater that was recovered from Christie's (see earlier comments). It had apparently been handled by Giacomo Medici and sold at Sotheby's in 1985.
