Parthenon marbles in European context

I have earlier commented on the way that the New Acropolis Museum will display the architectural marbles from the Parthenon within sight of the fifth century BCE temple on the Athenian acropolis. You will be able to wander down the south slope, past the theatre of Dionysos and straight into the museum.

At least to see part of the surviving sculptures. The rest are on the display a little further away.

At least for the moment.

Image derived from Google Earth.

Euphronios: The Lost Chalice by Vernon Silver

Vernon Silver has produced a remarkable book from his Oxford University doctoral research: it is a page turner. (I noted the acknowledgment to lunches with Colin Dexter author of the Inspector Morse novels.) It concentrates on the Euphronios cup that passed into the Bunker Hunt collection. However, the Sarpedon krater also features prominently.

I do not intend to write a full review here, but it would be appropriate to share some of the points. If anybody is in any doubt about the level of destruction caused by the looting process in order to supply the market they need to read The Lost Chalice. The account of the search for antiquities at Greppe Sant'Angelo at Cerveteri in Tuscany is sickening. This does not represent the casual finding of artefacts during agricultural work; it is the deliberate ransacking of ancient tombs in the search for saleable material.

Silver helped me to understand Giacomo Medici and The Lost Chalice provides a different position to that found in The Medici Conspiracy by Peter Watson and Celia Todeschini. It also allowed me to make sense of snippets of information about the market in Rome during the 1960s where "minor" antiquities were fed (relatively) openly onto the market while the major objects were taken for sale outside Europe.

The background to the fragmentary krater showing Herakles and Kyknos that was returned to Italy by Shelby White is reviewed. (I was interested to note who was advising Leon Levy about his purchases of Greek pottery.)

There is also information about the Sabina statue that was returned from Boston. It makes sense of the statement that it had once formed part of "an aristocratic family collection in Bavaria".

One of the strengths of this study is Silver's meticulous interviewing of key figures involved in the saga.

• Harper Collins

Keeping the marbles will now be terrible PR for Britain

Rowan Moore, the architecture critic for London's Evening Standard, has written a piece on his visit to the New Acropolis Museum in Athens ("Now let's return the Elgin Marbles", June 24, 2009). He is not totally enthusiastic about the new building:

You enter, under a vast, clumsy portico, an elephantine proboscis propped on three thumping columns. Throughout the building, architecture gets in the way of the exhibits. There are too many fat columns, and thick joints between panels, and holes cut in walls and ceiling for purposes of acoustics or lighting. The serene sculptures are interrupted with too much visual noise.

He also objects to the "pointless vandalism" of demolishing the Art Deco buildings that stand between the museum and the archaeological zone.

But the building has persuaded him of one thing:

Standing there on Sunday, as the first members of the public flooded in, and armed with all the arguments of a London patriot, I felt my objections melting away. It is partly that the Parthenon sculptures form a single work of art, which has been arbitrarily dismembered. This work can never be completely restored but there is still much to be gained from having as much as possible in one place. Like a shattered figure, it is good to reconnect the head to the neck to the torso, even if the feet and hands are permanently lost. To be more mundane, keeping the marbles will now be terrible PR for Britain. Each person who visits the new museum will see the same story: here is a great family of sculptures kept apart by the grouchy Brits, still exercising their imperial rights of loot and pillage. Most of all, the Greeks have shown, by building the museum, how much the marbles mean to them.

"Pot hunting" and absentee archaeologists?

I was interested to read the Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial on the "pot hunting" episode in the Four Corners region (June 21, 2009).

No one is endorsing wanton vandalism of such sites or artifacts. But it would be useful and realistic if a cooperative, rather than an adversarial, approach allowed quick surveys of such sites, with the most archaeologically promising being set aside for near-future professional digs, with residents told "Harvest the rest if you can."

How do all such artifacts -- even those unknown and undiscovered -- automatically become the property of absentee archaeologists who may never even show up?

The piece then points to two voices for the collecting lobby: Kate Fitz Gibbon and Peter Tompa (see my comments here).

Praise to "Doug" for leaving his thoughts on the Editorial:

The first false assumption is that the looted items "belong" to long dead peoples. Archaeological objects on federal lands belong to all Americans.

Second, an archaeologist who excavates such things never "owns" what he or she excavates. These items are strictly controlled, and the object's ownership goes to the federal government which often stores such objects in state museums. Implying that this is not the case belies a deep ignorance of the laws regarding public lands.

Ownership is the non-issue. Archaeology promotes good stewardship of our cosmopolitan cultural resources.

Survey on antiquities

Cherkea Howery, a graduate student at NYU, is conducting a survey on "Informing Audiences: Public Perceptions of Illicit Antiquities".

Click here to take part.

The results of the survey will appear on her blog.

Antiquities, ancient coins and changing attitudes in North America

Over the last few years over 100 antiquities have been returned to Italy from major North American museums. The piece that attracted the most publicity was the Sarpedon krater by Euphronios; it was returned by New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. Other items include a Roman portrait statue of Sabina, and quantities of pottery made in Apulia, southern Italy. These voluntary returns, offered without active legal action, have done much to restore the patinated reputations of museums.

The Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) that serves as an umbrella organisation for museums has now changed its policies on the acquisition of undocumented antiquities. The AAMD now advises constituent organisations not to buy objects that are unknown prior to 1970, the date of the UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property. A public object registry has been launched by the AAMD with the object of letting interested parties check what is passing into public collections. (The scheme has had limited use since its launch with a total of four items in the register by mid-June 2009.)

Some senior figures in the North American museum world --- for example, James Cuno --- have continued to voice their disquiet over the changing situation. But such views appear to be in a minority. Museum curators who handle archaeological material understand the issues and are aware of the level of destruction sustained by archaeological sites around the world to supply "museum quality" objects for the market.

The growing realisation that action needs to be taken about the antiquities market has been reflected in the work of the US Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC). The most noticeable action was over antiquities from Iraq in the wake of the Second Gulf War and the looting of the Baghdad Museum. However there have also been memoranda of agreement with countries such as Italy, China and Cyprus.

The workings of CPAC are now under scrutiny. A Freedom of Information Act suit (FOIA) was filed against the US Department of State back in November 2007; this was in response to the restriction on the imports of ancient coins from Cyprus. This action was supported by three bodies: the Ancient Coin Collectors Guild (ACCG), the International Association of Professional Numismatists (IAPN), and the Professional Numismatists Guild (PNG).

The purpose of the FOIA suit is made clear on the ACCG website:

The State Department recently imposed unprecedented import restrictions on ancient coins from Cyprus—requiring importers of even a single common coin of “Cypriot type” to provide unfair, unworkable and unnecessary documentation.

Why have these bodies taken such action against the US Department of State?

The IAPN, based in Brussels, Belgium, states on its website:

The IAPN is a non-profit organisation of the leading international numismatic firms founded 1951. The objectives of the Association are the development of a healthy and prosperous numismatic trade conducted according to the highest standards of business ethics and commercial practice.

The PNG describes itself as follows:

The PNG is a nonprofit organization composed of the world's top rare coin and paper money experts. As numismatic professionals, our primary mission is to make the hobby safe for collectors and investors by maintaining rigid standards of excellence for our member dealers.

This is clarified as follows:

The Professional Numismatists Guild, Inc. is the only numismatic organization in the United States that restricts its membership to dealers who possess and demonstrate three essential qualifications: Knowledge, Integrity and Responsibility.

Is this alliance of three organisations in reality acting over freedom of information? Could there also be an implicit commercial interest in the liberalisation of the market in ancient coins?

The US State Department, as Defendant in the case, seems to suspect ulterior motives and made this statement in their formal reply (dated May 19, 2009):

Consequently, Plaintiffs’ claims that they are advocating the public interest are properly viewed with some skepticism given ACCG’s “two phase” “coordinated plan” to attempt to rescind the import restrictions, which would commercially benefit a number of its benefactors, who appear to be U.S.-based dealers and brokers of ancient coins.

This statement has been refuted by the Plaintiffs (the ACCG, the IAPN, and the PNG).

In April 2009 the ACCG tested the agreements with Cyprus and China by deliberately bringing a set of ancient coins in the USA by air ("Coin Collectors to Challenge State Department on Import Restrictions", PR Newswire May 13, 2009).

As mandated, U.S. Customs detained the coins upon arrival. The ACCG now plans to use this detention as a vehicle to strike down the unprecedented regulations banning importation of whole classes of ancient coins. The collectors' advocacy group claims that, among other abnormalities, the decision process for these agreements was orchestrated contrary to the spirit and intent of governing law.

The ACCG seems intent on criticising a policy that is intended to offer some protection to the archaeological heritage of Cyprus and China by placing restrictions on the movement of material that may have been derived as a result of illicit diggings on archaeological sites.

So will the legal action and test case merely serve to inflame the situation? Do such actions present to the world an image of North American collectors of archaeological material (and that includes ancient coins) who are more interested in owning objects than preserving archaeological contexts and integrity?

Papoulias: Now is the time ...

The President of Greece, Dr Karolos Papoulias, has been quoted in the New York Times ("Greece presses its case", June 22, 2009) in the wake of the opening of The Acropolis Museum. Speaking about the Parthenon he is quoted:

It's time to heal the wounds of the monument with the return of the marbles which belong to it.

Shaded Marbles

To mark the opening of the New Acropolis Museum in Athens.

Shaded marbles is also available here.

Congratulations on the Opening of the New Acropolis Museum

I would like to offer my congratulations on the opening of the New Acropolis Museum.

Image © David Gill

Looting Matters: The New Acropolis Museum Opens in Athens, Greece

Looting Matters: The New Acropolis Museum Opens in Athens, Greece

"A catalyst for the return of the Parthenon Marbles"

On the eve of the opening of the New Acropolis Museum there have been some more quotes from key figures (Elena Becatoros, "New Acropolis Museum highlights missing marbles", AP June 19, 2009).

Dimitris Pantermalis, the museum's director, is quoted over the Parthenon sculptures:

This was an act of barbarism that can be corrected ... It's not an issue of pointing a finger at the British Museum, but of building bridges ... that can correct the unfortunate historic event of 1800.

Antonis Samaris, the Hellenic Minister of Culture, commented on the opening:

In essence it will be a constant, silent denunciation of the Parthenon Marbles' continued absence ... [The new museum] is a catalyst for the return of the Parthenon Marbles.

The alternative view is expressed by Hannah Boulton, the press officer of the British Museum, who restates the position of the universal museum:

I think they belong to all of us. We are all global citizens these days ... The Acropolis Museum is obviously going to be a fantastic new museum. ... It's obviously going to be wonderful to finally be able to see all the sculptures that remain in Athens on public display ... But ... here in the British Museum, they can tell this equally important, although different story about ancient Athens' place, in world cultures.

Image © David Gill.

The Parthenon Marbles: Athens or London?

Here are some thoughts on the display of the Parthenon marbles recorded live on the Athenian Akropolis.

Is a video blog helpful? Please leave your thoughts.

Displaying the Parthenon Sculptures

From Saturday it will be possible to stand in the upper gallery of the New Acropolis Museum and look across at the Parthenon. Archaeological material from the range of sites within the Acropolis area will be on display as part of a coherent scheme.

Mithraic Relief Recovered in Italy

There is a report that Italian police recovered a second century CE relief of Mithras back in March ("Italy police recover looted relief of Roman god", AP June 16, 2009). The raid took place on a private house near Rome.

It seems that some sort of transaction was about to take place as a Japanese private collector was involved.

The New Acropolis Museum: Archaeological Material in Context

The New Acropolis Museum is due to open in Athens this week. This is a project that captures my imagination. It brings together the sculptures, inscriptions and other archaeological material from the area of the Athenian Acropolis and displays them together in a single location.

There is an ascent through the archaic sculptures dating to the sixth and early fifth centuries BCE. Statues of women, riders and scribes reflect the types of dedications that were being made in this urban sanctuary in the decades leading up to the Persian Wars. The surviving colours on the painted marble are perhaps testimony to the tidying operation that took place after the Persian destruction. Here are the architectural and sculptural remains of the early temple of Athena that was built under the Tyranny.

This display prepares the visitor for the ascent to the level where the sculptures (and casts) from the Parthenon itself are displayed. The frieze looks outwards as it would have done on the original building (and unlike the display in the Duveen Gallery in the British Museum). There is also a visual link with the Parthenon itself.

Elsewhere objects from some of the smaller sanctuaries that littered the slopes of the Acropolis are on display reminding us of the diversity of cult activity in the heart of this ancient city.

So why does this new museum capture my imagination?

It is because it gathers together archaeological material from a single area of one ancient city in one coherent display. The New Acropolis Museum is not an encyclopedic museum; there is no need for it to take that mantle. This is unashamedly an archaeological museum that presents the finds to new generations of visitors from around the world. In that sense it is a universal museum.

Image © David Gill

Lord Owen on the Parthenon Marbles

Lord Owen has written a letter to The Times (June 15, 2009) about the Hellenic Ministry of Culture's rejection of the offer of a loan of the Parthenon sculptures presently residing in the British Museum. The letter comments:

The only way that the Elgin Marbles can make periodic visits to the new Acropolis Museum, which is highly desirable, is if there is an EU cultural treaty couched in general terms allowing for the transfer of antiquities between the museums of member states in a way that guarantees, under international law, all aspects of their movement. In this way the EU would be demonstrating that it is a unique international organisation capable of ensuring the cultural heritage of its citizens without establishing precedents that could lead to the return to their country of origin of many objets d’art which enrich the museums of the EU member states.

For the full letter click here.

Butrint Return: from Albania to Rome via London

Last month I commented on the return of a head of Asclepius that had been excavated at Butrint in Albania. The head had been seized from the Rome collection of Massimo Rossi back in 2005. It appears that the sculpture had been purchased at Christie's in London at an auction on July 6, 1996, lot 430 (Besar Likmeta, "Stolen Antiquities Face Difficult Journey Home", June 12, 2009). It is not clear who consigned the head to Christie's.

Likmeta also comments on a head of Livia that seems to have disappeared from Butrint at the same time. This is said to have been offered to a museum in Germany by Robert Hecht. Hecht returned the portrait to Albania in 2000.

Hellenic Ministry of Culture responds to the British Museum

Antonis Samaras of the Hellenic Ministry of Culture has responded to a radio interview given by Hannah Boulton, a press officer at the British Museum on Skaï (press release, June 11, 2009; story on Skaï; see also "Greece rejects Parthenon Marbles loan offer: ministry", Agence France Presse, June 11, 2009).

Boulton apparently said that the Trustees of the British Museum would be willing to consider a three month loan on condition that the Hellenic Government accepted British ownership of the sculptures (αν η ελληνική κυβέρνηση αναγνώριζε ότι ανήκουν στο Βρετανικό Μουσείο).

Samaras felt that this indicated that the British Museum was willing to enter a dialogue with the Greek authorities. The British offer was rejected (Η Κυβέρνηση, ωστόσο, όπως θα έκανε και κάθε άλλη ελληνική κυβέρνηση στη θέση της, είναι υποχρεωμένη να απαντήσει αρνητικά στη συγκεκριμένη πρόταση του Βρετανικού Μουσείου). Samaras would consider offering the British Museum material to fill the space (the Duveen Gallery) left by the Parthenon sculptures.

Image
The New Akropolis Museum © David Gill.

Looting Matters: Why is Greece Reclaiming so Much Cultural Property?

Looting Matters: Why is Greece Reclaiming so Much Cultural Property?

Replica of the Getty kouros

I noticed a short notice in Il Giorno (April 14, 2009). It looks like the rivalry between Gianfranco Becchina --- apparently a one-time supplier of olive oil to the White House --- and Giacomo Medici has taken another turn. Medici has commissioned a replica of the Getty kouros that has been presented to the museum; the original was purchased from Becchina.

Greece and the return of antiquities

Greece has been stepping up its campaign for the return of recently looted antiquities. One of the most famous cases in recently years involved the Aidonia Treasure that had apparently been found in Mycenaean graves not far from Nemea in the Peloponnese. These gold items surfaced in a New York gallery in 1993.

Other objects include a marble funerary lekythos that was returned in the spring of 2008 from a dealer in Switzerland. A fragmentary marble funerary stele, from a rural cemetery in Attica, was returned to Greece in July 2008; the other part of it had been found during excavations. The repatriated upper section was returned by a North American collector. This same collector also handed over a bronze calyx-krater that is reported to have been found in a rich grave in northern Greece.

A gold funerary wreath is also likely to have been found in grave somewhere in Macedonia. This had been acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 1993 after passing through Switzerland. Two other pieces were returned from the Getty at the same time: a Boeotian funerary stele of Athanias that was purchased from a North American gallery in 1993, and a marble kore purchased from Robin Symes in 1993.

A further notable piece that has been brought back to Greece is the bronze "Saarbrücken youth". This was seized in Germany back in 1998 and is thought to have been found off the coast near Preveza.

More recently Greek authorities have called for the return of three antiquities acquired by the Michael C. Carlos Museum at Emory University in 2002 and 2006.

Greece has also been successful in reclaiming a number of objects that have been stolen from its collections, notably an Apollo from Gortyn on Crete, and some of the material raided from the archaeological museum in Corinth.

Photographic evidence is likely to play a major part in Greece's continuing search for its looted treasures. A set of images featuring antiquities were seized in 2006 on the island of Schinoussa: this photographic evidence has been handed over to a Greek state prosecutor. It is likely that a further series of returns are likely as the objects are identified. This future Hellenic "homecoming" could be as extensive as the one celebrated by Italy in the "Nostoi" exhibitions in Rome.

Borsetshire metal-detecting search thwarted

Followers of BBC Radio 4's "The Archers" will know that Eddie and Joe had sneaked onto Oliver's land to investiage a "tump" with their metal-detector.

Concerned that Eddie and Joe are sneaking up to Grange Farm to uncover their supposed hoard with the metal detector, Clarrie tips Ed the wink. So when Joe and Eddie are busy digging, Oliver arrives with Ed. Since they thought he was away at a conference, this is a bit of a shock.

Ed explains that, just as Eddie suggested, he told Oliver all about the tump and the coins they found there. So Oliver has come to see what they find. Cornered, and well aware that he and Ed had no such conversation, Eddie can only agree. Unfortunately, all they find is some old machinery. Clarrie apologises to Oliver, but he’s not angry. In fact, he says they can dig on the farm any time and they’ll split the findings between them.

As Paul Barford has noted, should the PAS Finds Officer have been informed?

Looted Tiles Returned to Iran

At the end of last week it was reported in the Iranian press that "dozens of historic decorative tiles" that had been looted from Iran had been handed to officials at the Iranian Embassy in London ("Smuggled tiles to be returned to Iran", May 30, 2009). The tiles had been removed ("ripped") from the tomb of Sultan Shihab al-Din Sultan Ahmad at Dyla in northern Iran.

Seyyed Ali Mousavi, the legal adviser at the Iranian embassy in London, is quoted:

The tiles are about 600 years old. They were stolen from the tomb of Sultan Shihab al-Din Sultan Ahmad and were smuggled out of the country ... They were taken to London from Dubai to be sold in an auction ... Interpol in London confiscated the tiles after Iran presented the related documents that indicated that they belonged to Iran.

There is also a statement from the UK's Metropolitan Police("Tiles from Sultan's tomb returned to Iran", May 29, 2009):

They [sc. the tiles] were sent for auction at Bonham's Auction House, New Bond Street however experts became suspicious of their origins and alerted the Art & Antiques Unit.

The unit conducted a thorough investigation in co-operation with the Cultural Property Unit in Iran. Photographs of the tiles in situ together with photographs taken following the theft helped to positively identify them.

A collector who bought the tiles in "good faith" from a dealer in Dubai has assisted the police and has released his title claim on the objects.

There is also a comment from DS Vernon Rapley the investigating officer:

It is very satisfying to know that these valuable cultural objects will once again be displayed within the tomb from which they were so callously taken.

We are very grateful for the close co-operation of the Iranian Embassy in London and the Cultural officials who assisted our investigation in Tehran.

The diary in The Independent (June 5, 2009) also notes the tiles:

police gave back to the Iranian government hundreds of tiles, which had been removed from the ancient tomb of of Sultan Shihab al-Din Sultan Ahmad in Northern Iran, and had appeared at Bonham's auction house in London. Auctioneers had become suspicious of their provenance and handed them back.

Image
Presstv.ir

Roman wall-painting seized from Manhattan gallery

A second antiquity was seized by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Manhattan on Monday("ICE seizes a cultural artifact reported stolen in Italy almost 12 years ago", press release). The Roman fresco had been been identified by the Art Loss Register. The wall-painting had been found at Boscoreale and had then been kept in a store at Pompeii. It had been noted as stolen in June 1997.

Five other fragments stolen with it have now been recovered.

• London, unspecified gallery, press release February 2009

Image Courtesy of ICE

Corinthian krater recovered from Christie's

On Monday this week (June 1 2009) staff of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are reported to have recovered a Corinthian column-krater from Christie's in New York ("Stolen Italian artifact smuggled into the United States found at auction house", press release). The items had apparently been identified through a photographic image.

The press release notes:

The investigation into the Corinthian column krater revealed it may have been illegally introduced into the art market by Giacomo Medici and a third party at Sotheby's Auction house in 1985.

Does this mean that the krater appears in the archive of Polaroids seized in raids on the Geneva Freeport?

An item that had passed through one of Sotheby's London sales in 1985 had to be withdrawn from auction at Bonhams last October, and two other pieces that had surfaced by the same route in the same year have also been returned to Italy.

A second Corinthian column-krater has been returned to Italy from the Cleveland Museum of Art.

This announcement coincides with my observations on an Attic cup that had surfaced through a Sotheby's sale in 1984 and that is also due to be auctioned by Christie's.

Image
Image Courtesy of ICE.

Sotheby's 1984 sale: a re-emergence

In October 2008 Bonhams (London) had to withdraw several pieces. Among them was:

• Lot 10: Apulian hydria. Surfaced: Sotheby's London, Antiquities, May 21st, 1984, lot 384. [see list]
  

(At least three other pieces from this sale had passed through the Graham Geddes collection: lots 222 [Apulian hydria], 372 [Paestan lebes gamikos], and 408 [Apulian volute-krater].)

This incident should alert vendors to potential problems with this specific May 1984 sale given that antiquities that passed through Sotheby's (London) in the 1980s have featured regularly in the returns to Italy (and see also other pieces withdrawn from sale at Bonham's).

The due diligence process will have no doubt been doubly thorough for lot 375 from the same May 1984 auction. The Attic black-figured Band cup is now due to be offered at Christie's on June 3, 2009, lot 104. Who was the original consignor for the cup?

The cup (lot 375) subsequently passed to the Royal-Athena Galleries, New York, 1984, and then the Summa Galleries, Beverley Hills. It is now being sold as part of the Allen E. Paulson Living Trust.

The names of Allen Paulson and Bruce McNall of Summa Stables coincide in the horse-racing world (e.g. "A Lengthy Test for Jade Hunter's Speed", The New York Times February 21, 1988, Sunday).

Reduced sale of antiquities at Sotheby's

I normally give a summary of the two sales of antiquities at Sotheby's New York (see comments on last June's sale). This week antiquities forms part of a sale of "Old Master Paintings, European Sculpture & Antiquities" (Thursday June 4, 2009) --- and there are only 70 lots containing antiquities.

What has happened to the market? Is it a sign of the current worldwide economic crisis or are there fewer antiquities with "good provenance" around?

Is the archaeology of the Balkans under threat?

The archaeology of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) is under serious threat. In 2006 it was claimed that some 1 million artefacts had been smuggled out of the country in the fifteen years since its independence in 1991. Pasko Kuzman, head of the National Directorate for the Protection of Cultural Heritage, has called for the return of the Koreschnica krater that is said to have been removed from a sixth century BCE burial mound in the south of the country. It is reported to be in the possession of an unidentified New York collector.

The piece, used for mixing water and wine, is apparently similar to a krater found at Trebinshte in the closing stages of the First World War near the (present) boundary between FYROM and Albania.

The mound at Koreschnica covered an underground burial chamber buried under 3.8 m of rocks and rubble. The burial was looted during the 1990s. Finds are said to have included some 18 Illyrian bronze helmets, and three bronze warriors. The krater had been used to contain the cremated remains of the person buried here.

Elsewhere in the Balkans a hoard of Byzantine silver is said to have been found at Pazardzhik in Bulgaria during the 1990s. Pieces from it were acquired by several museums in Greece.

The scale of the problem in Bulgaria is massive. A report in 2007 suggested that some 16,000 archaeological pieces had been seized from looters in the preceding 10 month period.

Museums, private collectors, auction houses, dealers and archaeologists need to work together to put a stop to this large-scale destruction of the archaeological heritage of this part of Europe.

Operation Phoenix: Ali Aboutaam "urges" others to repatriate antiquities

On May 19 it was reported that an unnamed Geneva dealer had returned 251 antiquities worth some €2 million (see earlier comments). My press release, "Looting Matters: Why Is Switzerland Featured so Frequently in the Return of Antiquities?", PR Newswire May 29, 2009 Friday 12:01 PM GMT subsequently noted:

"In May 2009 251 antiquities worth around 2 million Euros (US $2.8 million) were returned to Italy from a Geneva-based gallery."

One hour later another release appeared, "Phoenix Ancient Art Voluntarily Repatriates 251 Antiquities to Italy Worth $2.7 Million", PR Newswire May 29, 2009 Friday 1:00 PM GMT.

Phoenix Ancient Art, the world's leading dealer in rare treasures from ancient Western civilizations, announced today that it has voluntarily repatriated 251 antiquities valued at $2.7 Million (EU 2Million) to the State of Italy.

Why did it take ten days for Phoenix Ancient Art to make this statement? What prompted this latest move?

Ali Aboutaam was quoted in the release:

"We returned these ancient artifacts in the spirit of cooperation and collaboration with the international art world, and to demonstrate Phoenix's commitment to the preservation and repatriation of national treasures to their host countries ... We have, amicably settled the matter with the Italian authorities, and urge others in the art world to follow suit and also the lead of some of the world's great museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in repatriating antiquities whose provenance may be in doubt."

The press release suggests that the pieces were removed from archaeological contexts in Etruria and Southern Italy during the 1980s. It stress such looting was "unbeknownst to Phoenix"; in other words the pieces had been acquired in "good faith".

C. Michael Hedqvist, who is director of the Geneva gallery of Phoenix Ancient Art, is also quoted:

"To ensure the provenance of our items, we spend much of our time verifying an art work's pedigree. In our due diligence process we ask each seller of artwork for proof of identity, as well as for documents pertaining to how long the piece has been in circulation... The returned items were acquired by Phoenix a long time ago, without knowing of their doubtful provenance. Even though a court in Geneva in 2007 rejected the Italian claim and awarded title of the antiquities to Phoenix, proving that we were not at fault, we chose to return the disputed items to the Italian State."

Ali and Hicham Aboutaam have yet to explain their link with an antiquity returned from Princeton to Italy.

Aboutaam's urge that other institutions should "follow suit" and repatriate "antiquities whose provenance may be in doubt" will cause discomfort for two particular institutions:

• The St Louis Art Gallery: the Egyptian mummy mask
  
• The Cleveland Museum of Art: the Cleveland Apollo

Will these two museums be returning these two acquisitions in the near future?