More coverage of the controversy over the locations of the busts of the Eighth Earl of Elgin and his wife in Canada.

From:
The Herald (Scotland)

Elgin marble row with a difference as Canadian hotel seeks return of busts
MARTIN WILLIAMS
22 Feb 2011

IT sometimes seems that anything linked to the Elgin dynasty and made of marble is bound to become shrouded in controversy.

The long-running row between London and Athens is rumbling on over the sculptures known as the Parthenon Marbles, which were taken from the Acropolis.
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Scotland is due to hand back some more Aboriginal artefacts to Australia following negotiations with Glasgow City Council. This follows earlier previous returns made by museums in Edinburgh.

From:
The Herald (Scotland)

Aboriginal remains reclaimed
Phil Miller, Arts Correspondent
10 Dec 2010

Glasgow’s museums are to return the skeletal remains of three indigenous Australians to their home country.

The executive committee of Glasgow City Council yesterday agreed that the remains, including skulls, be returned to the Australian Government, in the latest of a series of repatriations in the last 10 years.
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Many African artefacts are in museums & private collections around the world & a significant proportion of these were acquired in circumstances of dubious legality. Many people think that some of these artefacts should be returned, but so far, campaigns have been relatively unsuccessful.

From:
Modern Ghana

Africa’s masterpieces must be returned
Source: The Herald
Africa | 15 hours ago

The restitution of a work of art or record to the country of origin enables a people to recover part of their memory and identity.

This pressing and contentious issue of the return and restitution of Africa’s looted art, antiques and cultural heritage, from today’s custodians of Euro-American museums, is one that requires urgent attention and government intervention of every African nation.
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Following recent requests, the British Museum predictably has come up with a long list of reasons why they believe the Rosetta Stone is better of in their institution than it would be in Egypt. With each new raft of reasons though it begins to look more & more as though they are grabbing at straws, desperately trying to preserve the status quo whilst ignoring the fact that the world has changed significantly in the last two hundred years since many of their artefacts were acquired.

From:
Daily Telegraph

The Rosetta Stone can be shared where it is
Despite Egypt’s overtures, the British Museum is the artefact’s natural home, suggests Roy Clare.
Published: 6:24AM GMT 10 Dec 2009

It’s a staple question at dinner parties or job interviews: if your house or office was burning down, what’s the one thing you would save? For the staff of the British Museum, the question might seem almost impossible to answer, given the wonderful riches contained in its collection. Yet if you pressed them, they would probably have to admit that the answer would be simple: the Rosetta Stone.

Discovered in Egypt by the French during Napoleon’s expedition, and acquired by the British as part of a peace settlement, the Rosetta Stone is a priceless and extraordinary item. The three languages displayed on it, translations of the same text, enabled us to make the first interpretations of Egyptian hieroglyphs. It is no surprise, then, that each year, millions of visitors to London seek out this exceptional artefact (and the thousands of others) in the galleries that present the world’s cultures in the British Museum.
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