Kazim Finally Convicted for Stealing the Lydian Brooch

I received this email today from my Turkish friend about the sentencing of Kazim Akbiyikoglu, the director of the Usak museum who had been on trial for more than two years over the Lydian hoard:

From Feb. 14:

"The former director of the Usak Museum was sentenced on Friday to serve 12 years and 11 months in prison for dereliction of duty and misappropriation of an atique brooch that went missing in 2006.
One accomplice received 12 years and 6 months in prison while 8 others were sentenced to jail terms between 10 months and most 6 years. The police learned that the brooch, part of a 2500-years-old collection called the Karun Treasure, was replaced by a fake and that the director was in contact with the alleged thieves."

Artifacts returned to Pakistan

Britain returns smuggled pottery to Pakistan

LONDON, Feb 9 (Reuters) - Britain on Monday handed back to Pakistan almost 200 smuggled pottery artefacts that were seized by British border officers two years ago.

The 198 bowls and vases were smuggled from Pakistan via Dubai and discovered by the UK Border Agency at London's Heathrow airport in 2007.

The 4,000-year-old relics, which originate from Pakistan's north western frontier, were examined by the British Museum and estimated to have a value of 100,000 pounds ($148,800).

"It's a sort of vandalism, people who steal invaluable things from developing countries at a very cheap price," Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Pakistan's High Commissioner to Britain, said at a ceremony in London.

"This is our nation's heritage which will go back, and people will be happy to see them in the museums," he added.

Smuggled antiques and historic relics often end up in the hands of private collectors willing to pay big sums of money.

"Where ancient sites are plundered for short-term gain, this results both in the loss of heritage items to indigenous people and irreparable damage to archaeological sites," said Tony Walker, director of the UK Border Agency.

Anil Rajput, the customs officer who seized the artefacts in 2007, said they were smuggled from Dubai in freight declared as 'normal pottery' for a value of only $100.

"When I opened the boxes and actually looked at the pots, it was clear that they were not mass-produced in a factory in Dubai," he said. (Reporting by Martina Fuchs, editing by Mark Trevelyan)

San Diego Appearance

MARCH 7, 2009

4pm-6pm

Universtiy of San Diego (USD)

Degheri Alumni Center

5998 Alcala Park

San Diego, CA 92110

March 7, 2009, 4:00-6:00 p.m.

Hosted by Alex and Suzette Valle

Special Introduction by Robert L. Pincus Ph.D, San Diego Union Tribune Art Critic/Books Editor

RSVP vallesuzette@gmail.com

A fantastic review for Loot

Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
February 7, 2009 Saturday 
First Edition
In short nonfiction

BYLINE: Reviews by Bruce Elder

SECTION: SPECTRUM; Books; Pg. 31

LOOT

By Sharon Waxman

Times Books

What do you feel about all those antiquities from Greece, Egypt, Italy and the Middle East that are now on display in museums all over the world? Should they be returned to their countries of origin or do you agree with Aggy Leroule, the Louvre's press attache who claims: "You end up thinking we're all a bunch of looters, thieves, exploiters, that we're some kind of criminals . . . but who would be interested in Greek sculpture if it were all in Greece? These pieces are great because they're in the Louvre."

This is a fabulously well-written book full of outrage and shady intrigue. When you blend a fine journalistic style with a postgraduate degree in Middle East studies, you have a person who can write entertainingly about one of the modern world's most divisive artistic problems.

Waxman brings many of the key figures alive, debates the issues with subtlety and nuance and exposes much of the cultural arrogance that still underpins the belief that Western museums have some right to hold antiquities.

A reader's response

Who does History belong to?  That is the question.
 
It belongs to the world. To assume that it belongs to the source country
is a fallacy.  Egypt of today has no respect for antiquity or the ancient
Egyptians. Or will they ever learn that respect.
 
Looting and greed exists and has existed for thousands of years and Egyptians
have done more damage than anyone else (Nasser's dam in the 1950's).
 
We should thank the people who saved these artifacts for all of us to see and
admire. Surely, some made much money, but think what they gave us.  
Think of their scholarship (translating hieroglyphics, for one) that contributed 
to our knowledge.
 
We should thank the museums for their work in preservation and displays as
most of us would never have seen any of these treasures without them.
 
Marcia Winick
Tucson, Arizona
world

Artifacts vs. Facsimiles: a solution?

-An interesting suggestion from a reader:

My thanks to you and all who contributed to the Times (C-Span) program.  As soon as it ended I logged onto Amazon and ordered both "Loot" and "Who Owns..."   I'm eager to hold and read your book.

But I suspect that neither book will address what I'm about to ask you to comment on, viz---

Technology developed just in the past 10 years or so has made it not only possible, but rather easy, to create "three-dimensional scans" of precious, fragile,objects, without even touching them in the process of scanning them. And then from the scan, one (or 100)facsimiles may be made (and/or holograms, of course). There would be no risk of a copy becoming the object of fraud, as the material itself would be (e.g.) some modern plastic.  As best I recall, the Rosetta Stone is behind glass, and the viewer would be reasonably satisfied (or would she??) if what she was seeing was (and was labelled as) a facsimile.  As for Nefertiti, and the like, surface color etc. would still be a problem.

This technology is quite different from long-known methods such as lost-wax, or rubber mold, etc., from which museum shops have long sold "copies" of objects----Those copies are (because of the older technology) always at least slightly off in terms of size (and quality, of course).

What I'm suggesting would be particularly useful for such situations as the Elgin marbles (which Hitchens wants returned to Athens in order that the entablature be "complete")----Athens could have "the whole thing" (of which half would be a copy), and Bloomsbury would also have "the whole thing" (of which the OTHER half would be a copy).

What I'm suggesting DOES, obviously, fail to meet what I call the "piece of the true cross" test---some sort of transendental "union" with the past that for some (but not all) people is crucial to the experience of being in the presence of an important object. But for so many objects (e.g."your" Zodiacal ceiling; the Parthenon pieces), it seems to me this would be (thanks to this quite-new technology) a solution that could be at least tolerable to all interested parties.

I'm not so grandiose as to think that no one until me, now, has thought of this----So my question is: Can you point me to one or two sources where this has been seriously discussed in either scholarly or political venues?

Many thanks
              Alan W. Heldman (B'ham AL)