I was in Egypt about two weeks before the arab spring revolution and not too long after terrorists shot a bunch of tourists in the Luxor area. There were very few tourists because of the terrorist attack, and so in Luxor my wife and I had a driver and a egyptoligist tour guide that normally works with large tour groups. They drove us around (with a handgun under the driver's seat and a rifle in the trunk that I pretended not to see) to different sites for a few days and the guide gave excellent academic-like guiding.
Later we were in Cairo and it felt like I had their main museum completely to myself. There were only a few tourists and they were outnumbered by the docents/security. We saw the tutankhamen exhibit by ourselves.
What I'm confused about is that I read that during the spring revolution the tutankhamen exhibit was looted, and yet it still goes on tour. It was here in Switzerland a couple of years ago. Are they showing copies of the original exhibits? Or I suppose not everything was on exhibit at once and so a subset was looted? I never got a good explanation to this.
Only some items were stolen or damaged, not everything.
During the security turmoil following the 25 January Revolution, the museum was broken into on 28 January 2011, by unidentified individuals, and 54 artifacts were stolen. Zahi Hawass, the then director of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, stated "My heart is broken and my blood is boiling".[30] Hawass later told The New York Times that thieves looking for gold broke 70 objects, including two sculptures of the pharaoh Tutankhamun and took two skulls from a research lab, before being stopped as they left the museum.[31] In response, the military cordoned off the museum to secure it against looting and theft.[32]
I'll admit that I might misunderstand the point but surely there is a gray area of what is considered "stolen" and what is "preserved"
Humans or groups can be responsible for many foolish acts. Stealing is one of those traits. I am open to accepting this when referring to the British Museum. However, I am also open to groups of people DESTROYING historical items all because they do not share their culture or religious views!
Again, I see no issue in Countries like UK returning items that's not theirs but only under grounds that they will be SAFE in their new (returned) home. However, the middle east is mixed with different cultures -- languages and religions. It's also a place of much conflict.
As a British man myself and interested in Ancient Egyptian mythology, I would be just as much heartbroken of ancient items being destroyed. You don't have to be an Egyptian who's lineage traces back to this historical times.
Its sad, really. One of these days those pyramids will likely be destroyed. Perhaps by War. Perhaps by religious uprising.
Again - is "stolen" correct, here? If the British did not take any of these back with them, would many of these items still be around? It could have been destroyed of gone missing.
I would add that these finds would, and many did, find there way to the black market, ending up in private collections, which is almost as bad as their destruction.
>As a British man myself and interested in Ancient Egyptian mythology, I would be just as much heartbroken of ancient items being destroyed. You don't have to be an Egyptian who's lineage traces back to this historical times.
That's none of Britain's concern. How would you feel if Americans showed up and started breaking the angels off of Westminster Abbey or carting off Stonehenge because they didn't trust you to keep them SAFE? You'd probably riot.
The belief that you're entitled to another culture's knowledge and artifacts is colonialist thinking. They have the right to destroy their own culture if they want, you only have the right to ask and negotiate with them as peers. What Britain did in many cases wrt these artifacts was clearly theft.
And Europeans stripped the Colosseum for parts and the Church destroyed the artifacts of European pagan culture. You people really have no moral high ground to stand on.
I’m conflicted. I understand the concept that stolen goods should be returned and it’s the right thing to do, but at the same time it was centuries ago and the preservation was done by them. I have seen well preserved exposition in that museum and then you visit the original country where it’s from and they themselves have nothing or very little left from that era.
We never fail to find someone to defend colonization!
> then you visit the original country where it’s from and they themselves have nothing or very little left from that era.
You seem to generalize quite a lot in order to validate your view point that everything stolen should stay stolen.
Sometimes it's the entire opposite. It's not being shown anywhere, it's just hidden in a museum collection in the UK. In other cases it's exposed but with very little relevant information because it's not particularly relevant to the local culture or the colonizer is too ashamed of the real history of how this object got there that they fail to explain the true story of it.
You're using the word "stolen" here with a lot of conviction but, imho, not a lot of rigor. In what sense did people "own" the artifacts that the British removed from Egypt? Who owned them? If nobody owned them, how were they "stolen"? That's the weak version of the problem.
The stronger version: how is it the case that Egypt, or Egyptians, today "own" something that has been in the British museum far longer than any of them have been alive? Even if the artifacts were wrongfully taken in the first instance, does that automatically mean that the only right thing to do is to return them, even after centuries? Are the myriad other interests that have accumulated in the interim simply not matter? How long domes something have to remain in Britain for it to meaningfully become part of British heritage as well as Egyptian? Should we also be working to return artifacts looted by the ancient Egyptians to their own ancestral homes, even though the looting occurred thousands of years ago when they were the dominant power? Perhaps they should give back everything south of the First Cataract to the Nubians. (Hopefully it's clear that this is a reductio not a policy proposal!)
That's not to say I think it's categorically acceptable for powerful nations to take historical artifacts. But I don't think this has really anything to do with "stealing" in the usual sense. if anything, that rhetoric just obscures the issues here that might truly be worth thinking about.
Probably so. I imagine the U.K. has laws that make such artifacts the formal property of the state. Was this true for 19th century Egypt?
I think it was true, on some level, at the time the bust of Nefertiti was taken in the 1920s. Supposedly, the Germans nominally followed some sort of legal process for removing the artifact -- though perhaps with less-than-full transparency.
Perhaps there are other reasons to claim that Egyptian artifacts were 'stolen.' But I'm trying to have a conversation about what those might be since the subject is not as obvious to me as others seem to think it is.
The Egyptian peasant lives today much the same as his ancestors did. It's a remarkable degree of continuity! And some works were removed contrary to law quite recently like the head of Nefertiti.
Interesting points, but can you explain how they apply here? It's interesting and, afaik, true that modern Egyptians's lives today are more similar to their ancient ancestors' than you might expect (moreso than in many other nations). But how should we think about the relevance of this fact to debates about looted artifacts? Does the fact that they still work fields irrigated by the Nile suffice to give them a claim to repatriate artifacts taken generation ago? (Perhaps there are more similarities than this. I don't mean to be flippant on this point, I just am not an expert on all the similarities.) Or is it significant that they have generally abandoned the ancient Egyptian religion in favor of Islam, have a President rather than a Pharaoh, own televisions and smartphones, are now generally safe from crocodiles, have controlled the Nile's annual flooding (whose volatility was a dominant source of danger and drama in ancient life), etc.?
Regarding the Bust of Nefertiti, I guess it's debatable whether 100 years ago qualifies as "quite recently," but I suppose it does seem like yesterday when one is thinking about ancient Egypt! In any case, the analysis certainly may differ depending on the artifact. If the the date of the looting makes a difference I think that only supports the general thrust of my argument.
> We never fail to find someone to defend colonization!
I think you are misrepresenting GP & parent's comments.
Yes, absolutely, totally, Brits have a well-deserved reputation of colonisation.
But as a hypothetical conundrum, who would you return the relics from a long expired society to -- the current (arguably quite distinct, religiously & culturally) administrations of those lands?
What moral right is exercised (or exercisable) of relics of, say, Atenism, crafted 3 to 4 thousand years ago -- locals with an orthogonal religion & culture, or foreigners with an orthogonal religion and culture?
(Personally I instinctively lean towards your take, albeit a little less abruptly - but I think it's all quite complicated - partly with the bizarre 'cultural birthright' thing, partly curator cred, less so the accessibility claims.)
> But as a hypothetical conundrum, who would you return the relics from a long expired society to -- the current (arguably quite distinct, religiously & culturally) administrations of those lands?
Has this ever been in doubt? With Egyptian artifacts, they’d go to Egypt, with looted Greek artifacts they’d go to Greece.
With the heads of Māori warriors, New Zealand Maori.
Are there any real world situations where it’s confusing as to who they would be returned to?
you could, even though I disagree, use that argument for some artifacts, but surely not for the massive collection of things from Greece and Egypt. Those are pretty obvious you can return to the modern countries that sit on those lands.
Event if culture and religion has changed those artifacts are part of those peoples heritage, if it weren't then why would the UK care about Stonehenge or Hadrian's Wall? Or Italians about the Coliseum?
Just a single anecdotal point but I'm from Latin America and while there's little indigenous blood in me I would still consider indigenous culture and artifacts as part of my culture and that's at the extreme end of colonisation as natives were pretty much wiped out.
You can have negative views of colonization and also accept the fact that most artifacts were lost because they were looted before Europeans even arrived.
A few simple examples of nations who have went through rather devastating wars and civil wars including Islamists who's main ideology is that anything pre-Islamic is to be destroyed as it might lead to heresy, and who go out of their way to destroy historical places and artifacts. And if not war, then the fact that the cultures of those areas traditionally dont value historical artifacts the same way the developped European, or Chinese influenced countries did in their times.
I am sorry but it is not defending colonization, it is a legitimate issue given that the middle east is stuck on an unresolved powder keg of issues, keeping the Pregammom in Britain instead of where it came from is a good thing.
Even during WW2 the UK, Germany and France set out programs to saveguard historical cultural treasures in protected areas.
> A few simple examples of nations who have went through rather devastating wars and civil wars including Islamists who's main ideology is that anything pre-Islamic is to be destroyed as it might lead to heresy, and who go out of their way to destroy historical places and artifacts.
The Reformation shows that this isn’t just an Islamic trait. Plenty of religious artifacts, and location were destroyed.
> the middle east is stuck on an unresolved powder keg of issues
It is. And several of the key players in this are missing from your comment. The US, the UK, Russia and China. This isn’t a problem with undeveloped Islamic countries, it’s considerably broader than that.
Can't this be on a case by case basis? After all, the British stole from so many places in the world - what if they returned stolen items to countries (India for example) that are interested and capable of safeguarding artifacts and didn't return to those countries where they might get destroyed (Afghanistan etc)?
What about examples where there was nothing like theft involved and no colonisation - the Pergamon Altar in the amazing Pergamon Museum in Berlin is a good example...
To be honest, this is what has always confused me about the land acknowledgements that are popular at the opening of events in various circles... it's not like any of the people doing this have an intention of giving the land back and going back to Europe.
Instead of whatever they're trying to do, it sounds more like they're rubbing it in the faces of the descendants.
something that confuses me a bit...
I was in Egypt about two weeks before the arab spring revolution and not too long after terrorists shot a bunch of tourists in the Luxor area. There were very few tourists because of the terrorist attack, and so in Luxor my wife and I had a driver and a egyptoligist tour guide that normally works with large tour groups. They drove us around (with a handgun under the driver's seat and a rifle in the trunk that I pretended not to see) to different sites for a few days and the guide gave excellent academic-like guiding.
Later we were in Cairo and it felt like I had their main museum completely to myself. There were only a few tourists and they were outnumbered by the docents/security. We saw the tutankhamen exhibit by ourselves.
What I'm confused about is that I read that during the spring revolution the tutankhamen exhibit was looted, and yet it still goes on tour. It was here in Switzerland a couple of years ago. Are they showing copies of the original exhibits? Or I suppose not everything was on exhibit at once and so a subset was looted? I never got a good explanation to this.
Only some items were stolen or damaged, not everything.
During the security turmoil following the 25 January Revolution, the museum was broken into on 28 January 2011, by unidentified individuals, and 54 artifacts were stolen. Zahi Hawass, the then director of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, stated "My heart is broken and my blood is boiling".[30] Hawass later told The New York Times that thieves looking for gold broke 70 objects, including two sculptures of the pharaoh Tutankhamun and took two skulls from a research lab, before being stopped as they left the museum.[31] In response, the military cordoned off the museum to secure it against looting and theft.[32]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_Museum
And a page about the foreign exhibitions and tours
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exhibitions_of_artifacts_from_...
The tour shows copies.
Not many pictures, some more pictures here: https://www.youarecurrent.com/2024/03/12/column-visiting-the...
Grabbed this one as it was the first I found that a picture from the museum looking out at the pyramids.
I highly recommend the podcast “Fall of civilizations” episode 18 Egypt.
Always facinated by ancient egypt... though never been there.
One day I will.. and this museum looks like a place I will truly appreciate looking around in.
I wonder if the British Museum will do the right thing and return previously stolen artefacts?
I'll admit that I might misunderstand the point but surely there is a gray area of what is considered "stolen" and what is "preserved"
Humans or groups can be responsible for many foolish acts. Stealing is one of those traits. I am open to accepting this when referring to the British Museum. However, I am also open to groups of people DESTROYING historical items all because they do not share their culture or religious views!
Again, I see no issue in Countries like UK returning items that's not theirs but only under grounds that they will be SAFE in their new (returned) home. However, the middle east is mixed with different cultures -- languages and religions. It's also a place of much conflict.
As a British man myself and interested in Ancient Egyptian mythology, I would be just as much heartbroken of ancient items being destroyed. You don't have to be an Egyptian who's lineage traces back to this historical times.
Its sad, really. One of these days those pyramids will likely be destroyed. Perhaps by War. Perhaps by religious uprising.
Again - is "stolen" correct, here? If the British did not take any of these back with them, would many of these items still be around? It could have been destroyed of gone missing.
Just a thought.
I would add that these finds would, and many did, find there way to the black market, ending up in private collections, which is almost as bad as their destruction.
>As a British man myself and interested in Ancient Egyptian mythology, I would be just as much heartbroken of ancient items being destroyed. You don't have to be an Egyptian who's lineage traces back to this historical times.
That's none of Britain's concern. How would you feel if Americans showed up and started breaking the angels off of Westminster Abbey or carting off Stonehenge because they didn't trust you to keep them SAFE? You'd probably riot.
The belief that you're entitled to another culture's knowledge and artifacts is colonialist thinking. They have the right to destroy their own culture if they want, you only have the right to ask and negotiate with them as peers. What Britain did in many cases wrt these artifacts was clearly theft.
And Europeans stripped the Colosseum for parts and the Church destroyed the artifacts of European pagan culture. You people really have no moral high ground to stand on.
I’m conflicted. I understand the concept that stolen goods should be returned and it’s the right thing to do, but at the same time it was centuries ago and the preservation was done by them. I have seen well preserved exposition in that museum and then you visit the original country where it’s from and they themselves have nothing or very little left from that era.
We never fail to find someone to defend colonization!
> then you visit the original country where it’s from and they themselves have nothing or very little left from that era.
You seem to generalize quite a lot in order to validate your view point that everything stolen should stay stolen.
Sometimes it's the entire opposite. It's not being shown anywhere, it's just hidden in a museum collection in the UK. In other cases it's exposed but with very little relevant information because it's not particularly relevant to the local culture or the colonizer is too ashamed of the real history of how this object got there that they fail to explain the true story of it.
Here's a great podcast that I hope will make you change your mind, lots of examples: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/1030-stuff-the-britis...
You're using the word "stolen" here with a lot of conviction but, imho, not a lot of rigor. In what sense did people "own" the artifacts that the British removed from Egypt? Who owned them? If nobody owned them, how were they "stolen"? That's the weak version of the problem.
The stronger version: how is it the case that Egypt, or Egyptians, today "own" something that has been in the British museum far longer than any of them have been alive? Even if the artifacts were wrongfully taken in the first instance, does that automatically mean that the only right thing to do is to return them, even after centuries? Are the myriad other interests that have accumulated in the interim simply not matter? How long domes something have to remain in Britain for it to meaningfully become part of British heritage as well as Egyptian? Should we also be working to return artifacts looted by the ancient Egyptians to their own ancestral homes, even though the looting occurred thousands of years ago when they were the dominant power? Perhaps they should give back everything south of the First Cataract to the Nubians. (Hopefully it's clear that this is a reductio not a policy proposal!)
That's not to say I think it's categorically acceptable for powerful nations to take historical artifacts. But I don't think this has really anything to do with "stealing" in the usual sense. if anything, that rhetoric just obscures the issues here that might truly be worth thinking about.
If someone went to England and took the rocks from Stonehenge and carted them off to a museum overseas, that would surely be stealing?
Probably so. I imagine the U.K. has laws that make such artifacts the formal property of the state. Was this true for 19th century Egypt?
I think it was true, on some level, at the time the bust of Nefertiti was taken in the 1920s. Supposedly, the Germans nominally followed some sort of legal process for removing the artifact -- though perhaps with less-than-full transparency.
Perhaps there are other reasons to claim that Egyptian artifacts were 'stolen.' But I'm trying to have a conversation about what those might be since the subject is not as obvious to me as others seem to think it is.
It seems likely that designating artifacts property of the state is something that happened as a result of looting/stealing/collecting in the past.
We see this happening now on a smaller scale with metal detecting and what happens with their finds.
The Egyptian peasant lives today much the same as his ancestors did. It's a remarkable degree of continuity! And some works were removed contrary to law quite recently like the head of Nefertiti.
Interesting points, but can you explain how they apply here? It's interesting and, afaik, true that modern Egyptians's lives today are more similar to their ancient ancestors' than you might expect (moreso than in many other nations). But how should we think about the relevance of this fact to debates about looted artifacts? Does the fact that they still work fields irrigated by the Nile suffice to give them a claim to repatriate artifacts taken generation ago? (Perhaps there are more similarities than this. I don't mean to be flippant on this point, I just am not an expert on all the similarities.) Or is it significant that they have generally abandoned the ancient Egyptian religion in favor of Islam, have a President rather than a Pharaoh, own televisions and smartphones, are now generally safe from crocodiles, have controlled the Nile's annual flooding (whose volatility was a dominant source of danger and drama in ancient life), etc.?
Regarding the Bust of Nefertiti, I guess it's debatable whether 100 years ago qualifies as "quite recently," but I suppose it does seem like yesterday when one is thinking about ancient Egypt! In any case, the analysis certainly may differ depending on the artifact. If the the date of the looting makes a difference I think that only supports the general thrust of my argument.
> We never fail to find someone to defend colonization!
I think you are misrepresenting GP & parent's comments.
Yes, absolutely, totally, Brits have a well-deserved reputation of colonisation.
But as a hypothetical conundrum, who would you return the relics from a long expired society to -- the current (arguably quite distinct, religiously & culturally) administrations of those lands?
What moral right is exercised (or exercisable) of relics of, say, Atenism, crafted 3 to 4 thousand years ago -- locals with an orthogonal religion & culture, or foreigners with an orthogonal religion and culture?
(Personally I instinctively lean towards your take, albeit a little less abruptly - but I think it's all quite complicated - partly with the bizarre 'cultural birthright' thing, partly curator cred, less so the accessibility claims.)
> But as a hypothetical conundrum, who would you return the relics from a long expired society to -- the current (arguably quite distinct, religiously & culturally) administrations of those lands?
Has this ever been in doubt? With Egyptian artifacts, they’d go to Egypt, with looted Greek artifacts they’d go to Greece. With the heads of Māori warriors, New Zealand Maori.
Are there any real world situations where it’s confusing as to who they would be returned to?
you could, even though I disagree, use that argument for some artifacts, but surely not for the massive collection of things from Greece and Egypt. Those are pretty obvious you can return to the modern countries that sit on those lands.
Event if culture and religion has changed those artifacts are part of those peoples heritage, if it weren't then why would the UK care about Stonehenge or Hadrian's Wall? Or Italians about the Coliseum?
Just a single anecdotal point but I'm from Latin America and while there's little indigenous blood in me I would still consider indigenous culture and artifacts as part of my culture and that's at the extreme end of colonisation as natives were pretty much wiped out.
You can have negative views of colonization and also accept the fact that most artifacts were lost because they were looted before Europeans even arrived.
> Syria 2011 > Lebanon 1970s > Algeria 1990s > Afghanistan 1990s
A few simple examples of nations who have went through rather devastating wars and civil wars including Islamists who's main ideology is that anything pre-Islamic is to be destroyed as it might lead to heresy, and who go out of their way to destroy historical places and artifacts. And if not war, then the fact that the cultures of those areas traditionally dont value historical artifacts the same way the developped European, or Chinese influenced countries did in their times.
I am sorry but it is not defending colonization, it is a legitimate issue given that the middle east is stuck on an unresolved powder keg of issues, keeping the Pregammom in Britain instead of where it came from is a good thing.
Even during WW2 the UK, Germany and France set out programs to saveguard historical cultural treasures in protected areas.
> Even during WW2 the UK, Germany and France set out programs to saveguard historical cultural treasures in protected areas.
Did they though? That sounds revisionist.
Eg The Badeker raids in one direction, a Bomber Harris and everything he did in the other.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baedeker_Blitz
> A few simple examples of nations who have went through rather devastating wars and civil wars including Islamists who's main ideology is that anything pre-Islamic is to be destroyed as it might lead to heresy, and who go out of their way to destroy historical places and artifacts.
The Reformation shows that this isn’t just an Islamic trait. Plenty of religious artifacts, and location were destroyed.
> the middle east is stuck on an unresolved powder keg of issues
It is. And several of the key players in this are missing from your comment. The US, the UK, Russia and China. This isn’t a problem with undeveloped Islamic countries, it’s considerably broader than that.
Can't this be on a case by case basis? After all, the British stole from so many places in the world - what if they returned stolen items to countries (India for example) that are interested and capable of safeguarding artifacts and didn't return to those countries where they might get destroyed (Afghanistan etc)?
What about examples where there was nothing like theft involved and no colonisation - the Pergamon Altar in the amazing Pergamon Museum in Berlin is a good example...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pergamon_Altar
Although the Pergamon Museum also has the Ishtar Gate which was basically smuggled out of Iraq brick by brick.
>It's not being shown anywhere, it's just hidden in a museum collection in the UK.
Are you under the impression that the British Museum does not show its Egyptian collections?
>it's not particularly relevant to the local culture
Ancient Egypt also has essentially nothing to do with the culture of most of Egypt, with the exception perhaps of the Copts.
This argument would be stronger if the Egyptians were displaying Stonehenge and a few long barrows.
USA should first return stolen land! All white Americans should get into refugee camps in desert!
To be honest, this is what has always confused me about the land acknowledgements that are popular at the opening of events in various circles... it's not like any of the people doing this have an intention of giving the land back and going back to Europe.
Instead of whatever they're trying to do, it sounds more like they're rubbing it in the faces of the descendants.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x73PkUvArJY
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/a-3000-year-old-br...
>The ministry found that the artifact had passed from a museum restoration specialist to a silver trader to the owner of a jewelry workshop.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpegg27g74do
>British Museum gems for sale on eBay - how a theft was exposed
The British Museum is also vulnerable to staff theft.