This case has appeared with very little warning (it was not previously a case that got much publicity compared to many other restitution cases) but looks like it will now be getting a lot more publicity. A group of Lawyers in Turkey are filing a lawsuit against the British Museum in the European Court of Human Rights. The reason for the suit is that they want the Halikarnassos Mausoleum to be returned to Turkey by the Museum.

From:
Zaman (Turkey)

Turkish Lawyers File Suit Against British Museum Halikarnassos Mausoleum
By Erkan Acar
Published: Tuesday August 02, 2005

A campaign has been launched for the restitution of Turkey over the Mausoleum of Halikarnassos that was transported from Bodrum in southern Turkey to the British Museum 150 years ago.

A documentary was prepared and 30,000 signatures were collected within the framework of the campaign. A group of lawyers is now preparing to file a lawsuit against the British Museum in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Nearly 30 lawyers from Istanbul and Izmir together with the Bodrum Municipality along with various non-government organizations launched a campaign for the restitution of the Mausoleum transported to London in 1846. Read the rest of this entry »

Finally statements are emerging from the British Government about the long overdue changes to the law to allow artefacts looted by the Nazis to be de-accessioned from Britain’s museums & returned to their rightful owners. Clearly this planned change in the law is as a direct follow up to the recent court case that ruled that it was not possible to over rule the British Museum Act without a change in the law.
While this is all very positive, I still can not understand the logic behind a law that will treat events that occurred during one specific period in history differently from those that happened during any other – cases end up being judged not on their validity, but on when they occurred. To me (while I can see why the museum’s are pushing for the change to take this form) this is complete nonsense – If two people had items stolen, but for one the items were stolen by someone French & for the other they were stolen by an Italian (assuming all other circumstances were the same) then would one case be more deserving than the other?

From:
BBC News

Last Updated: Friday, 29 July 2005, 11:28 GMT 12:28 UK
New look at Nazi looted art law
Four Old Master drawings looted by the Nazis could be returned to their original owner by the British Museum under proposed changes to legislation.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) is reviewing the law to make such returns legal.

Consultations on the legislation – which will be limited to items taken between 1933 to 1945 – will begin soon.
Read the rest of this entry »

An article in Cairo Magazine about the current request made by Egypt for the return of various artefacts adds a few points not covered by the previous articles.
Firstly, they look at the history of previous requests by Hawass for the return of artefacts. Secondly, the article looks at the way in which countries can work with UNESCO to resolve disputes & at what powers the organisation actually has in such cases.

From:
Cairo Magazine

Thursday July 28, 2005
Stolen treasures
Zahi Hawass wants the Rosetta Stone back—among other things
By Henry Huttinger

Egypt is once again calling for the return of several celebrated antiquities currently on display in museums across Europe and America, including the Rosetta stone, the famous granite slab that was crucial in deciphering hieroglyphics.

The campaign to recuperate priceless artifacts taken by colonial powers is not new. But in recent weeks Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities and the public face of archaeology in Egypt, has grown more strident in his demands in a campaign that coincides with a world tour of Egyptology’s favorite son, King Tutankhamun. Hawass has even threatened to shut down British and Belgian archaeological digs in Egypt if the artifacts are not returned.
Read the rest of this entry »

In many cases concerning repatriation of cultural treasures, the party currently holding the artefacts claims that if they are returned then they will not be looked after properly. Ethiopia is starting to prove that this will no be the case with the Axum Obelisk by consulting extensively with UNESCO about the best way to re-erect the Obelisk in its original location.

From:
Sudan Tribune

Ethiopia to discuss historic obelisk re-erection with UNESCO
Thursday July 28th, 2005 00:16.
ADDIS ABABA, July 27, 2005 (Xinhua) — An Ethiopian delegation left for France on Wednesday to discuss ways of re-erecting the historic Axum obelisk with the United Nations.
The Axum obelisk, weighing 160 tons and standing 24 meters high, is around 1,700 years old and has become a symbol of the Ethiopian people’s identity. In 1937, the invaders of fascist Italy dismantled and took it on the orders of Benito Mussolini. Italy returned the monument to the northern ancient town of Axum in April.
Read the rest of this entry »

Russia continues to hold a large amount of artefacts that they took from Germany during the Second World War. Germany also holds a number of Russian artefacts. In all the discussions between the two countries about the return of these items tat were looted relatively recently, there is never much discussion of how items such as Etruscan sculptures ended up in German Museums in the first place.

From:
International Herald Tribune

Germany hankers for its heritage
By Judy Dempsey International Herald Tribune
THURSDAY, JULY 21, 2005

POTSDAM, Germany When Chancellor Gerhard Schröder traveled to Moscow in May for the lavish celebrations marking the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II, Germany’s museum directors and curators hoped against hope that Russia would start returning the art plundered by the Red Army after it took Berlin in the spring of 1945.

“Somehow we hoped that once the celebrations in Moscow had taken place, we could reach a deal over getting the art back and that a new era would begin,” said Klaus-Dieter Lehmann, president of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation. “I suppose we had been investing in that.”
Read the rest of this entry »

The Xiangtangshan caves in China were once adorned with many sculptures & brightly coloured paintings that were removed in the early twentieth century to museums & private collections.
A new project intends to digitise the displaced sculptures & re-create the original appearance of the caves so that they can be viewed in three dimensions on a computer.
Despite what this article suggests, use of computers for this purpose is not entirely new, & there have already been digital composites made of the Parthenon which unify the sculptures from their varying locations & the building itself. Of course, with the Parthenon it is an easier task than it would be with some monuments, as the original positions of the sculptures are very clearly documented & set out.

From:
Chicago Tribune

U. of C. project putting ancient pieces together
16th-Century temples in China to be seen in computer model
By Tran M. Phung
Tribune staff reporter
Published July 28, 2005

The Xiangtangshan Caves, comprising a dozen 6th-Century Buddhist cave temples south of Beijing, once contained elaborate altars adorned with sculpted limestone figures and bright paintings of gods and monsters.

But when the caves caught the interest of the international art market in the early 1900s, many of the artifacts were removed or badly damaged. Acid rain has eroded what remains.
Read the rest of this entry »

The looting from Greece & Egypt has been going on over the course of centuries. Much of it was at the time behaviour that was deemed acceptable by many & it is only in recent years that it has been seen as a major problem. In Iraq however, operating within the context of current values, the destruction & looting of antiquities continues on a daily basis, robbing the country of its history.

It is interesting now, how the very institutions in the west whose collections contain many items looted in the past can be critical of the modern day looting without any pause for reflection on the issues surrounding their own artefacts.

From:
Asia Times

Middle East
Jul 9, 2005
The smash of civilizations
By Chalmers Johnson

Note from Tom Engelhardt, editor of Tomdispatch: The World Monuments Fund has placed Iraq on its list of the Earth’s 100 most endangered sites, the first time that a whole nation has been listed. The destruction began as Baghdad fell. First, there was the looting of the National Museum. That took care of some of the earliest words on clay, including, possibly, cuneiform tablets with missing parts of the epic of Gilgamesh. Soon after, the great libraries and archives of the capital went up in flames and books, letters, government documents, ancient Korans and religious manuscripts stretching back centuries vanished forever. Read the rest of this entry »

It appears that as Israel withdraws from Gaza they plan on taking many artefacts with them. The justification for this is that they will be better looked after, a reasoning that is bad enough when post-rationalised by the British Museum, but is even worse when it is planned as a strategy today, with no regard for the wishes of the owners of the artefacts.

From:
Jerusalem Post

Jul. 21, 2005 1:08 | Updated Jul. 21, 2005 15:49
Palestinians: Israel to steal artifacts
Palestinian archaeologists say they fear that when Israel withdraws from Gaza it will also take priceless archeological artifacts. Israeli officials have acknowledged this is a possibility.

A military installation in the northwestern tip of the Gaza Strip surrounds a sixth century Byzantine church, discovered in 1999 by an Israeli archaeologist. The well-preserved 1,461-year-old church, which measures 13 by 25 meters, has three large and colorful mosaics with floral-motifs and geometric shapes. Nearby is a Byzantine hot bath and artificial fishponds.
Read the rest of this entry »

The trial in the Italian courts of Getty curator Marion True started this week, but was then postponed after an initial hearing. True denies all charges & the Getty supports her in this assertion.

From:
Reuters

Getty curator on trial in Rome in stolen art case
18 Jul 2005 13:14:21 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Shasta Darlington

ROME, July 18 (Reuters) – The curator of antiquities at California’s respected J. Paul Getty Museum went on trial in Rome on Monday accused of receiving stolen artefacts in a case closely watched by the international art world.

After a decade-long investigation, Italian prosecutors charged Marion True, who has been with the Getty for over 20 years, of criminal conspiracy to receive stolen goods and illegal receipt of archaeological artefacts.
Read the rest of this entry »

Although this was rather obscured by the big Egyptian request at around the same time for the return of the five most important objects in foreign museums, this is actually a very different request.
Despite the long running dispute over the Elgin Marbles, the Greek government has always continued to allow British archaeologists to continue their work in the country & the British School of Archaeology is one of the longest running foreign schools in Greece.
This latest Egyptian request accuses both Britain & Belgium of stealing artefacts & threatens to shut down archaeological digs run by these countries if the two items in question are not returned.

From:
Canada.com

Egypt demands return of pharaonic reliefs from European institutions
Canadian Press
Monday, July 18, 2005

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) – Egypt demanded that institutions in Britain and Belgium return two pharaonic reliefs it says were chipped off tombs and stolen 30 years ago, threatening Sunday to end their archeological work here if they refuse.

The 4,400-year-old reliefs, taken from two tombs uncovered in 1965, are currently at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Britain and the Catholic University of Brussels. A request has been sent to both seeking their return, Culture Minister Farouq Hosni said in a statement.
Read the rest of this entry »

The Welsh have for some time been requesting the permanent display in Wales of the Golden Cape which was purchased by the British Museum.
Of course this article misses a number of key differences, or least that the cape was never part of an existing building, & that it is all in one location now, rather than being split between two countries.

From:
icWales

Renewed row over Wales’ golden cape
Jul 18 2005
Darren Devine, Western Mail

A FRESH row has begun over the ownership of a priceless golden cape that is to go on display at a museum in North Wales.

The ceremonial cape made of solid gold was discovered in Mold, North Wales, in 1833, but was bought by the British Museum, in London, three years later.
Read the rest of this entry »

We regularly hear about the importance of a specific artefact or group of artefacts, but all too often the mainstream press stops their description at this point & we are left to try & decipher for ourselves precisely what makes such an item significant. Richard Pankhurst uses this article to neatly outline some of the reasons why the Magdala Manuscripts held in the British Library are important in understanding many different aspects of Ethiopian culture & as a result should be available for more Ethiopians to study.

From:
Addis Tribune (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia)

Ethiopian Studies: A Call for Action
The Importance of Ethiopian Manuscripts
By Richard Pankhurst

Ethiopian manuscripts, which are mainly in the country’s classical language, Ge’ez, but also in Adare or Harari, Arabic and other languages, are of fundamental value for the study of Ethiopia’s history and culture.
Read the rest of this entry »