[HN Gopher] The Netherlands has returned some stolen artifacts t...
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The Netherlands has returned some stolen artifacts to Indonesia
Author : Brajeshwar
Score : 153 points
Date : 2024-10-01 14:13 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.smithsonianmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.smithsonianmag.com)
| snapcaster wrote:
| Nice! I think about this every time i'm in an English museum
| matrix2003 wrote:
| I know some of the museums aren't the right place to keep some
| of the artifacts, but I also feel that _in general_ they have
| been good stewards.
|
| My counterpoint is wondering how many would have been destroyed
| by ISIS or civil unrest in some of the less stable regions of
| the world.
| mikrl wrote:
| >My counterpoint is wondering how many would have been
| destroyed by ISIS or civil unrest in some of the less stable
| regions of the world.
|
| This line of thought is fascinating to me.
|
| We should preserve them for all of humanity? Who chooses the
| custodian?
|
| We want a more nationalist case for repatriation to country
| of origin? If they get destroyed, it's not the self-professed
| custodian nation's problem or loss.
|
| Cynical, perhaps, but you need to balance self-determination
| with preservation. Maybe having their artifacts back will
| provide a drive to stability for the sake of heritage.
| matrix2003 wrote:
| I'm actually not sold on my argument, but was rather
| playing devil's advocate.
|
| I can't help but feel that all future generations should
| have the opportunity to learn from artifacts as well, but
| I'm saying that from a Western perspective.
|
| I have no idea how one should fairly choose a custodian or
| determine what "stability" really means.
|
| Maybe as humans touch all corners of the globe, we just
| accept that historical artifacts are ephemeral things and
| enjoy them while they last.
| TeaBrain wrote:
| >Maybe having their artifacts back
|
| The idea that modern Egyptians have any claim over the
| artifacts when they don't share a culture or civilization
| with those who created the artifacts is tenuous. The
| artifacts don't belong to the land itself. They belonged to
| people of a no longer existing civilization that once
| inhabited the land.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| There's 2 separate Hague conventions establishing an
| international framework for how to protect heritage in
| conflict regions. They're not perfect (like pretty much any
| convention), but they address all the basic issues like
| sheltering artifacts abroad and dedicating military units to
| prevent destruction.
|
| Also, western institutions have not been ideal stewards
| themselves, historically. The Pergamon kept the Ishtar gate
| through bombings in WW2 and the GDR. The British Museum has
| lost untold numbers of artifacts because they don't even have
| the resources to do a complete catalog of their collection,
| let alone properly conserve them.
| arethuza wrote:
| Speaking of the Pergamon Museum I think the actual Pergamon
| Altar might be better off back in the actual site of
| Pergamon - now in Turkey.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pergamon_Altar
| matrix2003 wrote:
| All good points! I did not realize military units were
| dedicated to this.
|
| I'm personally saddened by all the artifacts destroyed
| recently in the Middle East over ideological differences.
| gadders wrote:
| >>There's 2 separate Hague conventions establishing an
| international framework for how to protect heritage in
| conflict regions.
|
| It's not working well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha
| s_of_Bamiyan#Destruction...
| notpushkin wrote:
| > While some critics of repatriation have raised concerns over
| how poorer countries will care for their returned artifacts,
| Marieke van Bommel, director general of the National Museum of
| World Cultures, tells the New York Times' Lynsey Chutel that "the
| thief cannot tell the rightful owners what to do with their
| property."
|
| But the government of the country the artifacts are being
| returned into isn't the rightful owner. (I do think returning is
| the right thing to do, but it should be a bit more thought
| through.)
| pfortuny wrote:
| This is spot on. Why should a "mosern country" be the owner of
| an artifact? I wonder honestly, I am not just whining.
| ajsnigrutin wrote:
| You steal a mummy from egipt, take it to london, put it in a
| museum.
|
| Who has more claim on the item... someone who stole it and
| kept it for 100, 150, 200 years? Or people of egypt
| represented by their government,living in an area where the
| mummy was stolen from?
| umvi wrote:
| Yeah but it gets absurd if enough time passes.
|
| "Your ancestors wronged my ancestors 1000 years ago, so now
| modern you owes modern me"
| soco wrote:
| Yes, and repay it by giving back said object. Egypt or
| those countries didn't ask for rent or back payments so
| let's stop imagining strawmen.
| TeaBrain wrote:
| Repay what? The people of modern Egypt have no connection
| or inheritance claim to the ancient artifacts, other than
| their having been created in a similar place where the
| modern Egyptians are currently living. They don't even
| share a remotely similar culture. The same is true of
| many other places that had their artifacts collected, in
| that the people have no legal claim to the artifacts
| other than their having existed in a place in time nor do
| they often have any shared culture with the people who
| created the artifacts.
| satvikpendem wrote:
| Indeed, it is even arguable whether they are even
| genetically similar to the ancient Egyptians, due to the
| migration of the Arabs from the peninsula when spreading
| Islam over time.
| roughly wrote:
| This is I think a thing that is difficult for Americans
| to understand, because the only Americans who have a
| thousand years of family history in the place they
| currently live are also asking museums for their stuff
| back.
| jahewson wrote:
| There's a big difference between a culture that mostly
| ceased to exist in the past 200 years, because of the
| USA, and one that ceased to exist 3500 years ago.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| false dilemma, there are more options
|
| the "most right" answer doesn't mean its the right answer.
| compromise results in wrong answers when there is a right
| answer. this isn't a standardized test.
| moi2388 wrote:
| Depending on the time period, anyone between the Egyptians,
| Hyksos, Nubians, Libyans, Persians, Assyrians and the
| Romans, and indeed the British, since they all at one point
| were the official rulers of Egypt.
|
| I have no idea why citizens of modern Egypt, which didn't
| get formed until 1953, would be more entitled to up to 3500
| year old artifacts more than the then actual owners (agree
| with the means or not)
| rightbyte wrote:
| Mummies are maybe a bad example, as one could argue, that
| bodies should be by their grave.
| bell-cot wrote:
| Or a perfect example - because there are extremely few
| cultures and circumstances in which very old human graves
| are moved when the government or rulers changed?
| nickff wrote:
| Graves generally aren't permanent; most plots are leased
| for a fixed term. What is done with the caskets and
| contents thereafter varies widely.
| graemep wrote:
| > Or people of egypt represented by their government,living
| in an area where the mummy was stolen from?
|
| Whose culture and polity have no continuity with that of
| the people who made the mummy, but rather with that of
| later invaders.
| pfortuny wrote:
| What do you mean "stole"? From whom? They were literally
| abandoned.
| noworriesnate wrote:
| Because they are more secure there. These are irreplaceable
| items. Pick your favorite cultural artifact, would you help
| move it to a more secure location if there was a lot of
| instability that could lead to it being destroyed? Even if
| that more secure location was a different country? I
| personally would.
| pfortuny wrote:
| Sorry: I must have explained myself badly. We agree (I
| preder the artifacts in, say, London rather than in modern
| "Egypt").
| Metacelsus wrote:
| especially when you consider the British Museum hasn't been
| great about preventing theft recently
| isodev wrote:
| > isn't the rightful owner.
|
| And who is qualified to determine the "rightful owner"? The
| current government of the nation from which the items were
| taken is the one in charge of policy regarding their cultural
| and historical artefacts.
| ckuehne wrote:
| There is no "nation from which the items were taken".
| isodev wrote:
| I'm not sure I follow - The items were taken from somewhere
| at some point in time and now there is a country on that
| territory.
| returningfory2 wrote:
| Take an extreme hypothetical. Suppose in the 1500s the
| government of Spain had taken some artifacts relating to
| the indigenous peoples of New Mexico. Would the
| government of the United States really be the rightful
| owner of these artifacts?
|
| For other countries it's not quite as extreme, but in
| general the link between ancient culture in place X and
| modern country in place X is less strong than people try
| to make out.
| isodev wrote:
| I don't see the controversy of your example because since
| there was no UNESCO and other global agreements in the
| 1500s, the indigenous people of this area are still
| around and so it would be the local Native American
| tribes that can have a legitimate claim on their
| heritage.
| pie420 wrote:
| Lots of native american tribes committed genocide and
| destroyed other tribes. If Tribe A made some artifacts,
| and then was genocided out of existence by Tribe B, which
| was then conquered by the Tribe C (USA). Would you want
| Tribe B to have ownership of the artifacts of tribe B?
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| It is an interesting theory, if I understand it. Is the
| Idea that controlling a geographic region makes one the
| rightful heir to any artifacts created by people and
| cultures previously in the region?
|
| Does the USA have a claim to all indigenous Artifacts
| created in the US? It doesn't seem that different than
| Egypt laying claim to Egyptian artifacts.
| isodev wrote:
| I think it's clear the spirit of my comment was to mean
| that the descendants of the original owners would be one
| of the parties with a claim to have their artefacts
| repatriated. It's clearly not a strictly geographical
| problem.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Are we talking genetic ancestry? What if the genetic
| ancestors have little in common with the current
| geographic population What if the genetic ancestors
| themselves were brutal slavers and overlords who
| extracted the riches by force?
| bee_rider wrote:
| The idea of a nation-state is surprisingly recent and not
| completely universal, right? Historically people might be
| organized along kinship, tribal, ethnic, religious, or
| some other lines. Then an empire could pop up and control
| various groups of those, often against their wills,
| sometimes via intermediaries (which might not even map
| well to the underlying peoples).
|
| I do think the best thing to do is to return artifacts to
| their rightful owners, but figuring out who the rightful
| owners is, can be quite difficult.
|
| I mean, if they stole some artifacts from a tribe, which
| was subsequently wiped out by a tribe of bitter rivals,
| do they give their artifacts back to the rival tribe that
| later went on to form a government? (Just as a
| hypothetical, hopefully this is general enough that it is
| clear that I'm not trying to describe any particular real
| situation).
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Interesting thought. Perhaps the Egyptian relics should
| be repatriated to modern day practitioners of Egyptian
| polytheism. I believe the Kemetic Orthodoxy is currently
| headquartered in Illinois, USA.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kemetic_Orthodoxy#Worship
| bee_rider wrote:
| Hah. I'm going to intentionally pass on that one, my main
| point was that it is hard to make these decisions. The
| existence of surprising edge cases like yours just goes
| to show that it is a hard problem.
| aithrowawaycomm wrote:
| Many artifacts were stolen from legitimate kingdoms / village
| councils / etc that no longer exist, so for these artifacts
| returning it to the corresponding modern government is fairly
| appropriate.
|
| Otherwise, unless there is a clear claim of individual/familial
| ownership vis descendancy, then returning artifacts to a legal
| national government is still a least bad option. In this case
| the artifact belongs to the people and is stewarded by the
| peoples' government - the government doesn't "own" it in the
| way King Charles owns the Crown Jewels. (Ideally this
| government would be democratic, but international legitimacy
| should be enough for the UK to hand over the goods.)
|
| There are a ton of exceptions - Rohingya artifacts shouldn't be
| sent blindly into Myanmar - but I promise the people involved
| are taking this seriously. It seems condescending and arrogant
| van Bommel really failed to "think through" her usage of a
| metonymy.
| beaglessss wrote:
| Would make sense imo to auction them to the highest bidder
| and distribute it to the heirs. Or give the heirs shares of a
| corporation that holds the artifact.
|
| I'm not sure about Indonesia government but I'm confident if
| my forefathers made artifacts and it got 'returned' to US gov
| what would happen is a bunch of rich city dwellers would get
| to see it in an exhibit somewhere, some director will see a
| fat salary and meanwhile I have no share or compensation nor
| practical ability to access the artifact.
| angry_moose wrote:
| Stuff the British Stole is a really good podcast (Australian
| Broadcasting Corporation) that explores the difficulties of these
| situations:
|
| https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/stuff-the-british-sto...
|
| Things like:
|
| - The current government in power may not allow the artifacts to
| be returned to the original people, but will accept them and
| place them in the national museum. In many of these cases; the
| original people actually oppose the "return" for now, and are
| waiting for the political situation to change.
|
| - The current government actively blocks the return of artifacts
| as it would be victory for their opponents
|
| - In some cases, the artifact would have been wholly unremarkable
| except for the fact it was taken by the British; that is it has a
| lot more significance as a "Thing the British Stole" and would
| have been lost to time otherwise
|
| - Many artifacts require very intricate preservation activities
| that the receiving country isn't equipped for
|
| - If the artifact involves human remains, there are all kinds of
| laws preventing the movement/transfer/relocation of human remains
| in both countries
|
| In general I think returning them is a good thing, but more often
| than not there's an enormous legal/moral/ethical quagmire
| surrounding them
|
| Edit: No judgement intended either way on this particular
| instance. I just wanted to provide a good resource if others are
| interested in learning more about the general situation.
| arethuza wrote:
| The UK government occasionally does give things back on the
| understanding that they can be returned for a bit when
| required...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_of_Scone
| tivert wrote:
| I don't really see how that example is "giv[ing] things
| back." That stone is still the property of the British
| government and kept continuously on British territory.
| bell-cot wrote:
| It's Complicated(tm) - Scotland and England are,
| _currently_ , both part of Britain. Historically, not so
| much. And they were often far-from-friendly, with wars
| fought and everything. In a referendum 10 years ago, ~45%
| of Scottish voters wanted to separate again.
| arethuza wrote:
| My own reaction to the most recent Scottish independence
| referendum was pretty much "Oh well, at least we're still
| in the EU"...
| chgs wrote:
| Scotland and England has been the same country for far
| longer than say the USA has even existed.
| skylurk wrote:
| And Scotland has been crowning Scottish kings with it
| since before England even existed, if you believe the
| legends ;)
| chgs wrote:
| Including James 6th, who then took over England.
| rleigh wrote:
| They are both part of the United Kingdom (which is the
| union of the kingdoms of England and Scotland).
|
| Great Britain the name of the island both are located
| upon. England and Scotland will always be a part of
| Britain, because that's a geographical area, not a
| political one.
| libraryofbabel wrote:
| The Stone of Scone getting returned to Scotland is a bad
| example. Sure, it's symbolic, but Scotland is in the UK and
| so this was really just moving something around within the UK
| borders.
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _The Stone of Scone getting returned to Scotland is a bad
| example_
|
| The Stone of Scone is a good example of something else,
| though: if you declare that your king is coronated on a
| particular stone, when your neighbor conquers you what do
| you think your neighbor is going to do with the stone? Same
| thing you would do if you conquered them.
|
| Anyway, James VI of Scotland became King James I of
| England, which merged the claims, and meant that from then
| on, claims to the Scottish throne and claims to the English
| throne would be the same thing.
| trwhite wrote:
| - the artifact is likely to be seen by significantly more
| people and serves a much greater purpose to expose/educate
| those people (from other cultures) to/about the culture from
| which it came
| thinkingtoilet wrote:
| We should be thankful the British stole it!
| tetris11 wrote:
| Honestly, of all the empires that could have stolen I'm
| glad it was the British.
|
| Cruel, destabilizing, more atrocities than any other
| empire, but somehow the royal class had a culture of
| conservation for (some) wildlife and historical artefacts.
| danparsonson wrote:
| They had/have a culture of conserving wealth. Attractive
| gardens and foreign treasures are just conspicuous
| displays of wealth.
| noworriesnate wrote:
| > more atrocities than any other empire
|
| This is an interesting example of survivor's bias. We
| know about the atrocities the British Empire committed
| because many of their victims survived. You should read
| about the Soviets, the Assyrians, or heck even just read
| the Bible. History has a lot of atrocities in it. As an
| empire goes the British were pretty run-of-the-mill,
| maybe a bit light on the genocide.
| gadders wrote:
| >>Cruel, destabilizing, more atrocities than any other
| empire
|
| Lol, no. Not even close. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De
| struction_under_the_Mongol_E...
| thevillagechief wrote:
| Hey listen, I come from a country colonized by the
| British, and it was brutal. It's created generational
| poverty because they stole the most fertile land and have
| kept it until today, while sharing with a few corrupt
| Africans. But have you met the Belgians? Heard of King
| Leopold II? Now those guys know cruelty and atrocities.
| matwood wrote:
| You joke, but many of the artifacts in question would
| likely have been destroyed if it were not for the British
| stealing them.
| bee_rider wrote:
| That seems more like a judgement call that should be made by
| the legitimate owners of the artifacts (I liked in the other
| comment, that there was a focus on the problem of figuring
| out who the legitimate owners were, and the practicalities of
| getting them the artifacts).
| bpodgursky wrote:
| The legitimate owners died a long time ago.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I must have contributed to it somehow, since
| conversations require two parties. But I have no idea how
| we got from the thoughtful comment that focused on the
| interesting part of the problem, to here, and so quickly.
| danparsonson wrote:
| That argument wears thin very quickly, especially when the
| people of the culture from which the artifact originates are
| not able to view it (because it now lives in London instead
| of their home country), and thereby learn about their own
| history. See for example the Benin Bronzes; imagine that the
| original US Constitution document were housed in a museum in
| Nigeria.
| graemep wrote:
| The Benin Bronzes if returned will go to the descendants of
| the original owners - the kings of a kingdom built on
| slavery.
|
| I certainly know many people in countries from which these
| things were taken who think they are safer somewhere stable
| - I have heard exactly the comment that returning things
| will probably mean then end up stolen by politicians from
| Sri Lankans with regard to the things the Netherlands
| returned to Sri Lanka.
|
| Also, consider what would have happened if the things from
| what is now Iraq had been there at the mercy of the likes
| of ISIS.
|
| In many cases the people know occupying a territory have a
| different culture and history to the ancient people who
| made something. They may even have been the conquerors who
| destroyed the culture that made artifacts.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| > the kings of a kingdom built on slavery.
|
| You cannot put that as a reason to keep the artifacts in
| the UK, of all places.
| graemep wrote:
| Why not? The UK had being making huge military efforts to
| suppress the slave trade for ninety years at the time it
| seized the Bronzes:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Africa_Squadron
| makeitdouble wrote:
| That doesn't dispel that the kingdom has been built on
| slave trade. It's more about what happened from there.
|
| And of course there's a lot to say about it, even taking
| the absolute most charitable view, that's 90 years of
| mild effort after 3 centuries of slave trade. Considering
| what the UK keeps doing at that time and for the century
| after, I also wouldn't take the a naively charitable read
| of it in the first place.
| ipaddr wrote:
| Didn't the movement to stop slavery come from the UK?
| After that happened the African region refused to stop
| because it made them rich so England had to invade and
| created the Ivory Coast? England has a lot of
| credibility.
|
| The idea of reparations has come up. Should the US be
| paying or the African countries who profited and kept it
| going for another 100 years.
| BlackJack wrote:
| The British were engaged in the slave trade, then worked
| to outlaw slavery but replaced it with indentured
| servitude that was basically like slavery with a trivial
| income. That and exploitative colonial government meant
| you don't need slavery to loot everything.
|
| Reparations are a different topic and wouldn't
| necessarily solve the problems of slavery/colonization.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| A great many countries were engaged in the slave trade,
| especially those where the slaves originated.
|
| The British had the comparative advantage in shipping
| ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote:
| You lost me. Why not the UK of all places?
| makeitdouble wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Britain
| ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote:
| thanks for the link but still lost.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| It looks incredibly simple and clear to me, so I'm pretty
| curious about what is getting you lost, if you'd be
| inclined to expand.
| yread wrote:
| > end up stolen by politicians from Sri Lankans with
| regard to the things the Netherlands returned to Sri
| Lanka.
|
| I'm not sure if I understand what you're saying, but do
| you mean that Sri Lanka politicians stole the golden
| cannon or something else returned from Netherlands? Do
| you have a citation for that?
| whycome wrote:
| > kingdom built on slavery
|
| I'm not being facetious here, but isn't the USA (and
| other nations) basically that? So much of the wealth was
| accrued through the "low" labor costs of early industry.
| golergka wrote:
| Also, in a lot of cases people living there have no relation
| to people of culture that the artefact has originated from.
| And usually the way that happened was not much better than
| what British did with their colonisation of these countries
| later on.
| aamargulies wrote:
| Acaster's brilliant, funny bit on this:
|
| https://youtu.be/x73PkUvArJY?si=eRB3RIuR7rjXvw_i
| INTPenis wrote:
| I just learned about how in 1890 a ship filled with 19.5 tons
| of unwrapped cat mummies sailed from Alexandria to Liverpool,
| and the cargo was sold mostly as fertilizer.
|
| Now I also learned that Egyptian authorities have since found
| even more mummified cats, perhaps even millions. But it's still
| a very striking example of the plundering mentality of the big
| naval powers.
|
| https://www.bbc.com/reel/video/p0jr4z6k/why-tonnes-of-mummif...
| jahewson wrote:
| That's amazing. I'd heard of mummies being used for paint [1]
| but fertilizer is a new one. To be fair it's not "plundering"
| because they purchased them from an Egyptian farmer who
| discovered them on his land. Very much a two party activity.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mummy_brown
| INTPenis wrote:
| It's a complete disregard of a nation's heritage. Even if
| Egyptians were less focused on their legacy in the 19th
| century, they are today and have the means to preserve it
| now.
|
| To be semantic it's not plundering, even slaves were
| purchased from locals.
| Yizahi wrote:
| And massive return of artifacts (as opposed to one or two once
| every decade) will open some very inconvenient flood gates,
| like the fact that Britain was not the only empire in the
| history. And some "non-western" countries were or are empires
| too. Imagine that after India get their stuff back, Afghanistan
| comes next to India and asks for their share. That would be
| very bad optics. While without actually receiving stolen or
| gifted stuff, countries can keep their moral high ground and
| common external enemy (which is conveniently very far away).
| virtualritz wrote:
| There is a great comedy sketch from James Acaster that sums up
| the situation in- and the stance most other Western countries
| take on this, unfortunately:
|
| https://youtu.be/x73PkUvArJY?si=hFbY9_ySJGlnh4Ys
| MitPitt wrote:
| Unfortunately artifacts returned to their origin country are
| often sold off to private collection or are otherwise lost. First
| world countries are better at preservation of such things and
| should keep it.
| smabie wrote:
| Having had a few interactions with the Indonesian government, the
| Netherlands should have just kept them.
| gaoshan wrote:
| The labeling of things in museums as "stolen" is lacking, IMO. In
| some cases, yes... straight up looted items are in museums. In
| other cases, though, the items could easily have ended up lost to
| time (or political, economic, social turmoil) if they had not
| been taken and put in museums outside of the places where they
| originated. Additionally some of these places would not have had
| the means to care for antiquities back in the day.
|
| The discussion is important and the history of how these museums
| came to have the items they do is fraught with depredation but
| that is't the whole story. I feel like there is nuance around how
| many of these items that have ended up in the museums of the West
| and that nuance is paved over by labeling everything as stolen.
| jltsiren wrote:
| And in some cases, the items were lost because they were put in
| museums. Europe was not exactly a stable place in the 20th
| century. Many things were destroyed in the wars, and many items
| were stolen from museums by conquerors, individual soldiers,
| and looters.
| jahewson wrote:
| Such as?
|
| I don't see a single missing artifact on this list that was
| taken by Europeans and lost in WWI or WWII:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missing_treasures
|
| Plenty lost in other parts of the world though!
| jltsiren wrote:
| That is a very short list of particularly notable lost
| items. European museums had hundreds of millions of items
| in their collections, and many of them were lost. The
| number of documented pieces of art and artifacts lost in
| WW2 is in millions. The actual number is likely much
| higher, as the documents were often also lost. Nazis looted
| as a matter of policy. Soviets practiced wholesale
| destruction. Even Americans did widespread looting, often
| taking items that had first been stolen by Nazis.
|
| For a more concrete example: The Colonial Collections
| Committee report behind the article discusses a total of
| 390 items. 10 of them were known to be lost before the
| 1990s. Further 17 were not found in an inventory at that
| time. One additional item was determined to be a loss that
| had been reported earlier. Two further items had been
| reportedly transferred somewhere else, but their current
| status is unknown.
| rich_sasha wrote:
| Not in wartime, but in recent years, the British Museum, a
| prime holder of foreign antiques, reported they lost
| thousands of items. Some were found or recovered, but some
| were confirmed as stolen.
|
| https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crgy4w221z5o
| s_dev wrote:
| >The labeling of things in museums as "stolen" is lacking, IMO.
| In some cases, yes... straight up looted items are in museums.
|
| If the best place to hide a lie is between two truths then the
| best place to hide a stolen item is between two that were
| legitimately acquired. This debate always seems to acknowledge
| that there are items completely illigitmately acquired but then
| shrug shoulders that nothing can be done because there are
| other items that were legitmatley acquired and somehow that's
| supposed to be convicing.
|
| It's an idictment against the British Museum and by extension
| the UK that these items we do agree are stolen simply aren't
| returned.
| sangnoir wrote:
| > In other cases, though, the items could easily have ended up
| lost to time (or political, economic, social turmoil)
|
| That's a hard sell when the country that winds up with the
| artifacts was also the primary agitator of political, social
| and economic turmoil (you know, the usual colonial stuff). An
| arsonist shouldn't get to keep victims' heirlooms to "save them
| from the conflagration".
| ivan_gammel wrote:
| I like how museums in Berlin look at this problem. Once I
| visited an exhibition that was fully dedicated to provenance
| research and it did label some items, although with less
| straightforward language (I don't remember seeing the word
| ,,stolen"). https://www.smb.museum/en/research/provenance-
| research/
|
| And of course this has happened:
| https://www.smb.museum/en/museums-institutions/ethnologische...
| screye wrote:
| > political, economic, social turmoil
|
| I can see a happy medium, where (ex)colonizers return artifacts
| to neutral safe harbor near the home country.
|
| If Indonesia is unstable or if museums don't meet standards,
| then let artifacts be held in Australia. If Egypt is too
| unstable, then have the artifacts returned to Dubai. With the
| frequency of 'just stop oil' vandalism, I'm not sure if the
| west is the safest place for these artifacts anyway.
|
| Alternatively, national embassies also make for great safe
| harbor. This way the artifacts are nominally returned to the
| home country, without needing to cross borders or jeopardizing
| the artifact's safety.
| aunty_helen wrote:
| I've stood in the Cairo museum and looked at a wooden sarcophagus
| that's had all of it's gold chiseled off of it. Something that
| was once a work of art reduced to a wooden box for the price of a
| few ounces of gold. I have mixed feelings about repatriation and
| the elephant in the room, the British.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Seems to be a major bias in this perspective against the
| British. The contemporary Egyptians at the time of collection
| had even less interest in preservation.
|
| Do you even know that the gold was removed by the British, and
| not some enterprising locals? The British were not cultural
| outliers in their graverobbing. They were outliers in that they
| saw historical value in items and chose to preserve them,
| instead of deconstructing them.
| waffleiron wrote:
| There literally was an curator of the British Museum that stole
| 1800 artifacts and sold them for personal profit. Don't pretend
| this doesn't happen to the British.
|
| https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/26/british-museum-s...
| BoingBoomTschak wrote:
| Don't like the word "stolen" in this context, it sounds very
| newspeak-y compared to "plundered" or "looted". Ever heard of
| _Vae victis_?
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Even plundered and looted is often a misnomer.
|
| In many cases, they could be replaced with collected, saved,
| and preserved.
|
| Our current sense of historical preservation was not as
| pervasive in the past. In many places these materials would
| have been consumed or destroyed by locals who had more
| pragmatic concerns and no interest in the past.
| mihaic wrote:
| While these discussions are always loaded with sentimental
| intepretation, and complex questions of what "rightful owner"
| after hundreds or thousands of years even means, I think more of
| an emphasis should be put on impact for the population.
|
| After all, the British Museum, the main example for restitutions,
| is located in a global city, given completely free access to its
| huge collection on display and pays for preservation. The global
| cultural value it adds is much larger than individual museums all
| over the would could provide.
|
| > Marieke van Bommel, director general of the National Museum of
| World Cultures, tells the New York Times' Lynsey Chutel that "the
| thief cannot tell the rightful owners what to do with their
| property."
|
| And in the meantime the academic establishment seem to ignore
| doing what's best for the artefacts or the public. Abused
| children are taken away from their parents, but artefact are to
| simply be given back to whatever state has jurisdiction over some
| area they were in way back?
|
| There seems to not be a simple answer on when things should be
| given back or not, but at least some effort should be put into
| figuring out some triage criteria.
| chx wrote:
| https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@rygorous/113219189748801451
|
| > art project idea: "The British Museum", which is housed
| somewhere outside the UK and will accept and display any
| donations from anonymous donors into its collection that were
| provably stolen from Great Britain
| bilbo0s wrote:
| Well, in fairness, Britain would have the right to demand the
| artifacts be returned.
|
| Please don't shoot the messenger here. I'm just saying
| hypocrisy doesn't negate legal rights. I'm American, so no
| dog in the fight, but the UK would have the right to take
| those artifacts back.
| dijit wrote:
| I agree with the sentiment, however in some ways it should be
| something that is permitted to move.
|
| The UK has been very stable for a long time, however they are
| profiting indirectly from the museums, since it s a driver of
| tourism.
|
| Should the UK become less stable, we should have a hard look at
| ensuring the continuity of the collection. As others have
| mentioned, a lot of these things would have been destroyed or
| forgotten had the British not decided it was important to keep
| it - and as time goes on, those things become even more
| irreplaceable.
| yawnxyz wrote:
| If the UK became less stable, maybe someone like Germany
| could take custody and seize the collection, for UK's own
| good?
| dijit wrote:
| Or France, or Belgium, or Finland, or Netherlands.
| alluro2 wrote:
| That's quite a jump from discussing Germany taking
| custody of a museum collection. I don't think these
| countries would like being taken too.
| dijit wrote:
| If this is a joke I am perhaps too tired to understand
| it.
| alluro2 wrote:
| It was a pretty cheap and light-hearted aside shot at
| your comment meaning that Germany should, since we're
| talking about it taking the collection into custody, take
| those countries into custody as well. Nothing smart was
| missed - I wish you a good rest!
| comte7092 wrote:
| While London is indeed a global city, access is very much not
| equal.
|
| Immigration/tourism requirements are always the strictest
| against the very countries who were plundered during colonial
| times, in comparison to rich countries with an imperial
| past/present.
|
| Most of the world will never visit the UK. Most of the value
| that the British museum supplies goes back to the UK in the
| form of tourism and to close allies of the UK in terms of
| exposure to these artifacts.
| Cyph0n wrote:
| Exactly. The majority of HN users have a privilege that they
| are not even aware of: visa-free/on arrival access to a large
| chunk of the world.
| matwood wrote:
| What place is easier for 'most of the world' to visit?
| jogjayr wrote:
| Singapore allows visa-free travel to passport holders from
| 159 countries + many more with an e-visa or visa on
| arrival.
|
| The UK allows only 83 countries' passport holders visa-
| free.
|
| I picked Singapore at random. Probably some other country
| is even more visitor-friendly.
|
| https://embassies.net/singapore-visa-exemption
|
| https://embassies.net/united-kingdom-visa-exemption
| jahewson wrote:
| > Immigration/tourism requirements are always the strictest
| against the very countries who were plundered during colonial
| times
|
| Trivially false. The UK has strict requirements for Russia, a
| former imperial power. The USA was formerly 13 British
| colonies and has few restrictions.
| jogjayr wrote:
| The USA wasn't plundered as a colony.
| comte7092 wrote:
| The USA is a current imperial power and built atop of a
| genocide against its native population. The US as an entity
| _has_ no history that would be relevant to a historical
| plunder carried out by the British.
|
| Russia is currently in direct conflict with the UK
| (specifically financial and indirect military support to
| Ukraine, obviously not with regards to a hot war). Whereas
| that is not the case with any African nations I am aware
| of, yet many of those nations face significant travel
| restrictions not faced by a pre Ukraine invasion Russian
| population.
| TremendousJudge wrote:
| > After all, the British Museum, the main example for
| restitutions, is located in a global city, given completely
| free access to its huge collection on display and pays for
| preservation. The global cultural value it adds is much larger
| than individual museums all over the would could provide.
|
| Most of the collection of the British Museum is not on display
| at any given moment (if ever). They could lose 90% of their
| inventory and the display would be exactly the same.
|
| But that's beside the point. Museum entry may be free, but
| London is pretty expensive to go to, especially if you are from
| a place where the items in question were plundered (ie poor
| third world countries). In some cases it may even be illegal.
| Most of the people whose cultures those items belong to cannot
| afford to go visit the museum.
| mihaic wrote:
| Most of these third world countries also have some artefacts
| on their soil as well. Do they need literally all of them,
| and you'd have to visit the globe to see international
| artefacts? The most famous ones, like the Rosetta Stone, only
| became famous from their usage by Western archeologists.
|
| As for London being expensive, well visiting any foreign
| country is expensive by non-natives. At least in London you
| can get a large set of cultural exposure in a single visit.
|
| > Most of the people whose cultures those items belong to
| cannot afford to go visit the museum.
|
| There is no ancient Greek or Egyptian alive today, those
| cultures are long dead. What claim do modern inhabitants of
| those regions have over these artefacts?
| senderista wrote:
| Modern Greeks and Egyptians have significant genetic and
| cultural continuity with the ancient peoples of those
| regions. (No, the Arabs did not displace the Egyptians.)
| seatac76 wrote:
| This assumes global cultural value matters more than the native
| cultural value of the people to whom the artifacts belong.
|
| I think the default should be to return to the native country
| wherever possible. Although it does beg the question of what to
| do if the native countries have changed significantly due to
| imperialism/colonization, idk.
|
| But I do appreciate the value of cross cultural sharing so
| perhaps museums could have a rotating selection that they can
| borrow for some time from the native country, as long as the
| transport does not have negative impacts on the artifacts.
| jntun wrote:
| Looting and pillaging is fine, as long as you build an entire
| economic / social system around it? Because that is the only
| semblance of logic I can take away from your statements. These
| museums didn't just pop into place for the artifacts to reside
| in; they were built to show off their spoils.
| ipaddr wrote:
| Take the Taliban example of destroying Buddhist culture in
| the 90s. They are/were the current people in power would you
| suggest returning items to be destroyed or carefully
| preserving them for future. Would you return items to a place
| incapable of taking care of them?
| jntun wrote:
| Do you have any interest in talking about the British &
| American roles in funding, training, and arming the Taliban
| in the 70, 80s, and early 90s? Or would you prefer creating
| a hypothetical where we are burdened to take care of the
| people who just can't take care of themselves (after we
| wreak havoc on them)?
| ipaddr wrote:
| We can talk about the US and USSR proxy wars and how they
| trained and armed people on different sides because they
| did not want to engage directly. Doesn't change the fact
| that the Buddhist cultural items were being destroyed
| because it conflicted with their version of Islam.
| Handing them back would be unwise.
| jntun wrote:
| Well I don't want to talk about that first part, mainly
| because it's a very poor interpretation of history. You
| brought up the Taliban and I wanted to investigate that
| thought you had further. You seem to be trying to paint
| an ideological picture unrelated to the topic and insist
| on a leading question built on the assumption "if you
| give the artifact back, it will be destroyed".
| devsda wrote:
| > Would you return items to a place incapable of taking
| care of them?
|
| Isn't this like saying "I'm not going to return what I
| stole because you clearly aren't capable of taking care of
| it, if you are it would never have been stolen"
|
| I think there's a misunderstanding about the intention
| behind asking for return of stolen artifacts. It's not
| aleays about the artifacts themselves or how valuable they
| are or preserving them at all.
|
| Returning items is like acknowledgment of historical
| mistakes and a signal that the other party is ready to make
| amends.
|
| Merely acknowledging the mistake while holding onto the
| stolen artifacts is just a lip service that isn't even
| sincere.
| ipaddr wrote:
| It's like taking a pet fish from your friends house. He
| moves but you want to give it back to the new home owner
| who doesn't have tank. Not a good remedy. Neither is
| giving it back to your friend if he isn't allowed pets in
| his new home.
|
| The fish should never been taken but trying to do the
| ideal thing will kill the fish. Be practical not
| idealist.
| mihaic wrote:
| > These museums didn't just pop into place for the artifacts
| to reside in; they were built to show off their spoils.
|
| You have a very cynical and skewed view of things. These
| museums were built specifically for the public good, to show
| off things that were of no interest in their original
| countries at that time. The British didn't say they wanted to
| build public museums to increase tourism, that came later as
| an unintended consequence.
| jntun wrote:
| > to show off things that were of no interest in their
| original countries at that time
|
| You have a very cynical and skewed view of things.
| WhyNotHugo wrote:
| > British Museum, [...], is located in a global city, given
| completely free access to its huge collection on display and
| pays for preservation.
|
| It grants free access to British citizens and those few who can
| afford to travel to the UK. The grand majority of the world's
| population cannot afford this.
|
| Most important, the locals living in cities that were pillaged
| by the British can't access cultural items at all. Sure, the
| museum entry might be free, but they can't afford to travel to
| an island far far away.
| bee_rider wrote:
| It would be sort of interesting, maybe if there was some sort
| of right to visit these artifacts, the idea that the UK was
| preserving their cultures for these countries would be a little
| more defensible. What percentage of a country's population
| should be given a museum-funded trip to the UK, before we can
| say the museum is actually living up to that promise, I wonder?
| Half or so?
| veggieWHITES wrote:
| > complex questions of what "rightful owner" after hundreds or
| thousands of years even means
|
| I think that's besides the point.
|
| To me this means a goodhearted effort to right past wrongs.
| satvikpendem wrote:
| Perhaps not necessarily in this case, but something I do think
| about is, are not certain artifacts safer in the museums that can
| take care of them for future generations? There are many unstable
| countries in the world where that cannot happen, and I would want
| artifacts not destroyed due to wars or other sorts of fighting
| such as terrorism [0] such that future generations can see them.
| That is why I am not necessarily opposed to so called colonial
| governments continuing to hold on to relics, as the British
| Museum has stated.
|
| [0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/26/isis-
| fighters-...
| booleandilemma wrote:
| As always, if these things weren't taken and put in a museum in
| the first place, today they wouldn't even exist.
| blackeyeblitzar wrote:
| How many countries does England have stuff to return to?
| luaybs wrote:
| The amount of pro-colonial sentiment in the thread here is
| baffling. The people that were colonized and stolen from have the
| right to do whatever they want with these artifacts, even if you
| believe they may not have the means, or will sell them to private
| collectors.
| jbjbjbjb wrote:
| As someone originating from a colonised country - why not just
| accept the situation as part of the ebb and flow of history?
| They certainly weren't the first empires in history. I think a
| lot of the objection is more about nationalistic sentiment than
| anything else and I don't feel it needs to be done to reclaim
| cultural heritage.
| anonymous18473 wrote:
| Here is a take I haven't seen anywhere else: according to
| Wikipedia, when the Europeans took the Rosetta Stone it was
| nothing more than rock in some wall. The European then turned it
| into something truely special.
|
| A hot take on this could be to just return a rock of equal size.
| It is not clear how all the information gathered should be
| factored into this.
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