Dr. Hawass Calls For Return Of Stolen Artifact

[Kosmo]

How legitimate it's a claim of today Egipt to pharaonic objects?

Should Turkey have a similar claim to byzantine icons?

Should they belong solely to a "succesor" "nation" or to the world cultural heritage?

Should we send back everything that it's in the great museums to Mexic Cambodja, Greece etc and leave each country with artifacts of her "own"?

 

I've been to Cairo Museum and it's far worse then any collection in W. Europe that i've seen.

Most things are there with no lebel or order in huge dark corridors. The few labels are in an english worse that mine (and this means low )

They have more then enough to show and will be better to do something decent with what they have and what they will find instead of trying to be the only ones with egiptology collections. The museum they made for their victory (?) in the war of Yom Kippur looks better (from the outside) that the arheology museum.

 

For me all this it's just nationalist rethorics.

[longbow]

if Egypt somehow got a hold of the British crown jewels, decided to display them in Cairo museum, and then refused to return them, how would you react?

 

Personnaly i'd laugth my head off the crown jewels are horrible ugly pieces and they mean nothing to me,they may mean something to other Brits but i dont care about them (sorry).Anyway the nasty, thieving Colonizing British courts ruled in favour of the Indians in the Siva Icon case,which wasnt owned by the British museum,it was brought to the museum to be restored and the staff impounded the piece when they saw what it was,so were not all bad .

The British museum is wanting to return four drawings which were stolen from a Czech Jew by a Nazi during WW2 but its British LAW that nothing in the B.Museums vast collection can leave it.The Attorney General (Lord Goldsmith) has asked the High Court to clarify whether the museum has a moral duty to return property obtained improperly.If the High court rules in favour of returning property improperly obtained then the Elgin marbles (probably the most famous of Britains stolen artifacts,even though Elgin payed the Ottoman Emperor for them and if he never took them they would of probably been destroyed) could well be on there way back to Greece.

 

What i do want to see returned is the 36 Saxon drinking horns currently situated in North American university's,these pieces are not on public display the uni's use them to educate future archiologists.At least the 'stolen' artifacts in the British museum can be seen by anybody free of charge.

And while the Americans are giving the Horns back could they put London Bridge onto a boat and send that back too please

 

Personnaly i think the Elgin marbles and other such artifacts should be returned to there rightfull owners,as long as there going to be looked after properly and just as important displayed to the public for no money charge.

Do you think the French will ever give the British the Bayeaux Tapestry?And a good portion of the Louvre collection was looted by Napolean,give it back Frenchies

Edited June 6, 2006 by longbow

[Viggen]

<sarcasm>

i rather think this is bs...

 

because then i please want my railroads back that austrian KuK monarchy made in the 19th century for eastern europre, (and please can i have south tyrol back?), then all of the english villas in india, please back to england, and what about all the asian hordes that took all the gold from rome back 1700 years ago, no defenitely kazakhztan must be searched for this...

 

btw. todays egypt has as much to do with the ancient egyptians as the USa of about 500 years ago, oh right, there was no USA back then, so case closed...

 

...almost forgot, the whole of the wolrd has to be searched for ancient roman coins, they have to go back to Rome..</sarcasm>

 

cheers

viggen

[Pertinax]

You beat me to it..

 

As a modern Brit ..can I have restituiton for loss of my Romano -British heritage from any Saxons, loss of Saxon culture from Normans, Loss of Englishness from The Tudors...etc etc ad infinitum, only relativists can draw lines through cultural change.

[Primus Pilus]

I'm confused... should we poor misguided yanks leave this land to the our tribal forebears if you Europeans, Asians and Africans will make room for the 280 million of us or so?

 

And while we're on our way, go ahead and ship back any cultural items taken from the new world and return it to the rightful owners. That includes Central and South American gold, silver and jewels from you silly expansionist Spaniards. I've talked to the representatives of all the tribes and they promise to send back all those darn horses to whomever sent them over. All they do is smell up the place anyway.

[Pertinax]

I thought Pershing shot them all? (horses)

 

Well , we can get maybe three or four into our Clachan here , Pantagathus wanted to try the pubs anyway, but youd have to double bunk with the goats and wear woad at weekends, and for all-night sacrificial stuff.But 280 million is a big ask, my cousin Togodumus the Flatulent could take a few.

 

Seriously now..I was thinking about this in the context of truly great museums

 

http://www.prm.ox.ac.uk/

 

this being my personal favourite in terms of the awesome density of truly "folk" artefacts-millions of them.. I rather thought they belonged to no-one in particular and everyone if they wished to examine them.You cant keep a museum of artefacts where they are ridiculed as subversive or pagan (the Marbles) or unholy (Afgahnistan) so the accumulation of "valuables" would appear to fall to whichever culture is stable at any given time.So..historical collectoins are another accident of history are they not?

Edited June 6, 2006 by Pertinax

[tflex]

You know I had a feeling when I opened this thread, it might take the same turn the 'Apology of the Crusades' thread took.

 

I agree that Dr. Hawass is overly aggressive in asking for all the artifacts to be returned, especially the ones taken legally. But, I think his main targets are treasures such as the Rosetta stone, Nefertiti's bust etc. These treasures are nationally symbolic and highly prized. I don't object to his methods, many artifacts have already been returned since he started his campaign, but the big targets will be much harder to get. Also, seeing as the Mubarak adminstration has pretty good relations with Europe and the U.S., I can envision a scenario playing out in the future, where the Egyptian government will use it's influence and encourage western governments to mediate and pressure museums to return such treasures. If such items were returned to the Egyptian government, it has much to gain, more popularity with Egyptians, more presitige, more publicity, more tourists, which means more money. So they definately have the motivation on a national level.

 

P.S. Seeing that the relationship between the French government and the U.S. has dissintegrated the last few years, I think the U.S. should ship the Statue of Liberty to France.

Edited June 6, 2006 by tflex

[Primus Pilus]

I don't mean to be dismissive or trite on your thread tflex, but I can't explain myself any better when we really start to consider...

 

Where does it begin and where does it end? Who is the keeper of the records and the authority on who owns the rights to what?

[tflex]

I don't mean to be dismissive or trite on your thread tflex, but I can't explain myself any better when we really start to consider...

 

Where does it begin and where does it end? Who is the keeper of the records and the authority on who owns the rights to what?

 

 

No no, you got me wrong. I enjoy the humorous part, I got involved in that other thread too.

[Viggen]

ok, now serious,

 

what was illegal about french, british taking out those artifacts, did they happen against "THEN" any laws? Those countries were colonies and under british/french (whatever you want to pick) rule, so were was the illegal part?

 

Of course if you say any country that takes over another one is illegal then we really have a problem, because as someone said before, when do we start?

 

regards

viggen

[Rameses the Great]

what was illegal about french, british taking out those artifacts, did they happen against "THEN" any laws? Those countries were colonies and under british/french (whatever you want to pick) rule, so were was the illegal part?

 

What's the philosophy in this here, 'we make and you take?' It's not that the French and British are not entitled to 'some' artifacts, but you can't take another nation's glory. I don't know it they should change the current approach of how to go about the treasures. However the whole system of taking another nation's goods for plunder without second thoughts is completely backwards.

[Viggen]

what was illegal about french, british taking out those artifacts, did they happen against "THEN" any laws? Those countries were colonies and under british/french (whatever you want to pick) rule, so were was the illegal part?

 

What's the philosophy in this here, 'we make and you take?' It's not that the French and British are not entitled to 'some' artifacts, but you can't take another nation's glory. I don't know it they should change the current approach of how to go about the treasures. However the whole system of taking another nation's goods for plunder without second thoughts is completely backwards.

 

well, thats how the world worked the last what? yeah 10.000 years...

 

cheers

viggen

[tflex]

ok, now serious,

 

what was illegal about french, british taking out those artifacts, did they happen against "THEN" any laws? Those countries were colonies and under british/french (whatever you want to pick) rule, so were was the illegal part?

 

I don't think there were any written laws at that time, but I'm sure foriegn powers stealing treasures would have been illegal, there just wasn't anything the Egyptians could do about it. Also, it should be noted that many Egyptians profited from the sale of such treasures.

 

I don't object to Dr. Hawass's demands, whether I agree with his premise or not, he's doing what he's suppose to do, just like the colonial powers did what they had to do. His motives are no worse than the colonial powers at that time. If it works, then why not? If he has to villify the museums to justify his demands, then it's his right. The same way colonial powers plundered Egypt, it was their right, they were invaders and no one could oppose them, so they capitilized on the situation. I probably would have done the same thing if I was in their shoes, and would be doing the same thing if I was in Dr. Hawass's shoes. I guess it just depends on which side of the fence you are. But, I certainly don't think Hawass's demands are childish, immature, or stupid as some members have claimed.

Edited June 6, 2006 by tflex

[Primus Pilus]

Hmm, I wonder when Egypt will return Alexandria to Macedon.

[longbow]

 

 

 

I don't think there were any written laws at that time, but I'm sure foriegn powers stealing treasures would have been illegal, there just wasn't anything the Egyptians could do about it. Also, it should be noted that many Egyptians profited from the sale of such treasures.

Im confused by this did they steal them or pay for them?