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focused on the “adventure” of there are two main organizations that
getting the item and “saving” it have the authority to make that deter-
by bringing it to historians and mination by working in coordination
museums vs. to its original home. with local, state, national, and interna-
The monologue describes others tional law enforcement entities and the
asking Jones if he was a glorified general public. The international
grave robber. One could not help organization UNIDROIT also assists
but picture the last scene of the in these matters.
first Indiana Jones movie Raiders
of the Lost Ark with the boxed UNESCO
artifact being place somewhere in a tremendous warehouse. In 1944, the United Nations
This analogy to the taking of ancient and valuable items out of fostered the creation of UNESCO, the
“evil” hands to “do-gooder” hands is one demonstration of how objects United Nations Educational,
become transported, which begs the question: where do these objects Scientific, and Cultural Organization.
belong? The answer is complex. Its mission is to build peace through
international cooperation in Edu-
To Repatriate, or Not Repatriate? cation, the Sciences, and Culture.
That is the question. UNESCO has preserved 1,073
For some experts, it is a matter of whether or not the history can designated World Heritage sites in
only be told in its place of origin, if it still exists. For others, it is a 167 countries and published general
matter of where are these items best preserved? And still others consider histories of civilizations. Among the An illegally trafficked, incredibly
rare 2,000-year-old marble statue
the public benefit resulting from where collections are housed currently. many other parts of the organization is of a Greek goddess has been
In the same article from the March 3, 2019, issue of History Today, its mission to fight illicit trafficking, and returned to Libya after a long-
author Tiffany Jenkins wrote, “All of the artifacts we gaze upon today the return and restitution of cultural running repatriation case involving
were made for someone else and for some other purpose: to celebrate pro- perty. This is the body that maneu- experts at the British Museum.
the powerful; for worship; or for ordinary household use. Regardless of vers through international laws and the
intent, soon after any object is made, it passes out of the hands of the intricate negotiations needed to repatriate significant historical items to
creator into those of others—patrons, family, friends, thieves—new their country of origin.
owners, crossing continents and centuries, and changing use as it does. Examples of their work include the return of more
“A terrifying sculpture, once an object of domination or devotion, than 12,000 pre-Columbian objects from Italy to
becomes in a gallery an object of enlightenment, beauty, or a Ecuador in June 2020; the return of 11 dinosaur
social text to be read. Next to other artifacts from different fossils to Mongolia from the Republic of Korea in
times and places it can provoke questions, illustrate April 2017; and a 5th millennium BC funeral
relationships and take on an elevated meaning. trousseau returned to Italy from Germany in
That is the value of museums.” January 2020. The work done through UNESCO
But in the next paragraph, Marie Rodet, is intense and is not all-encompassing because the
senior lecturer in the History of Africa at the dissemination of artifacts across museums, collectors,
University of London, wrote, “Artifacts taken According to a report in The Guardian, a collection of governments, and the black market is just too broad.
from Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Oceania, eight ancient artifacts seized by the London
and the Americas during colonialism belong Metropolitan police from an antiquities dealer have U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
and should be returned to their countries of been repatriated to Iraq, based upon an identification According to its website (www.ice.gov), ICE
origin. Most of the global artifacts that are made by scholars at the British Museum. Cuneiform “stands at the forefront of our nation’s efforts to
inscriptions on the 5,000-year-old ceramics named a
now held in European museums were either Sumerian king, a temple, and a dedication, which strengthen border security and prevent the illegal
looted or bought for a value far below that of indicated they had been taken from Iraq’s ancient city movement of people, goods, and fund into, within,
the European art market price at the time of of Girsu. archaeology.org photo: British Museum and out of the United States.” The Cultural
their acquisition.” Property, Art, and Antiquities Program (CPAA) is
But to wind up this debate, Nicholas Thomas, the director for the the core program for investigating the movement of antiquities coming
Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge, states “The into and out of the U.S. ICE has also trained over 400 agents in the
issue is not in the end where artefacts ‘belong’ but where they can be identification, authentication, and handling of cultural objects which,
culturally and socially beneficial. Some collections should be returned to as told on their website, “supports their return to their rightful owners
their nations of origin, but communities in Africa, Oceania, and else- through cultural repatriation.” These agents are the “boots on the
where should have access not only to their own heritage but also to the ground” when it comes to investigating cultural property crime.
Once an investigation is complete, Homeland Security (HSI) agents
Six frescoes from the coordinate the return of the object(s) to their rightful owners.
walls of ancient villas in One example of their work is the June 2018 return of a historic 500-
southern Italy have been year-old letter from Christopher Columbus sharing information on his
handed over to authori-
ties in Pompeii. Three of discoveries in the Americas to the Kingdom of Spain. The letter was
the frescoes were stolen stolen from the National Library of Catalonia in Barcelona and sold for
from two Roman houses approximately $1 million. Since 2007, more than 12,000 objects have
in Stabiae as early as the been repatriated to over 30 countries.
1970s and sold to collec-
tors in the United States, International Institute for the Uni-
Britain, and Switzerland. fication of Private Law (UNIDROIT)
world art that is so accessible to multicultural publics in Europe. Another international organization,
Historic artefacts are representative not only of humanity’s achieve- UNIDROIT, works internationally to
ments, but of the travel and traffic that have formed the world order we try and make the multitude of laws
all now inhabit.” involved in any case of stolen or lost
objects work together to create a sound
conclusion respected by all those
International Antiquities Law Enforcement involved. Its purpose is to study needs
Along with the debate over the placement of antiquities is whether
or not they arrived at their current location legally. Here in the U.S., Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) returned 523 pre-Hispanic archeological pieces
that were illegally imported into the U.S. from Mexico and offered for sale.
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