#stolen artifacts

[travelinglikethelight]

nefertiti: who does she belong to?

#nefertiti #queen nefertiti #nefertiti bust #neferneferuaten nefertiti #18th dynasty #ancient egypt #neues museum #akhenaten #echnaton #amarna #stolen artifacts #documentary #arte tv #gifs #berlin germany #egypt #egyptology

[blatantescapism]

Did you see the news about the artifacts stolen from the Stolen Artifacts Museum?

Someone working on the inside of the British Museum has been stealing artifacts from their vaults since at least 2016.

More than one expert recognized artifacts being sold on EBay and alerted the British Museum upper management, but they ignored and gaslit the whistleblowers- for two years.

The British Museum uses the excuse of “protecting” artifacts to justify its refusal to repatriate stolen treasures. The news has reinvigorated many campaigns for repatriation. Especially for the looted pieces of the Parthenon, aka the Elgin Marbles.

The main suspect, the guy who was recently fired, the guy whose name was on the EBay account fencing the artifacts,

was the acting keeper of the Elgin Marbles.

The museum officials and the BBC are giving slanted updates to try to make it seem less bad than it actually is, but it’s bad:

#british museum #stolen art #stolen artifacts #the british museum #art news #museum #museum news #elgin marbles #parthenon #greek art

[raspberry-gloaming]

For everyone ever interested in the "make the British and the museums give back what they stole" - did you know we have LITERAL LAWS that say that the big museums aren't legally allowed to give people back there stuff permenantly?

Like how fucked up is that

#i didn't actually know this until it got mentioned on the news the other day #as some artifacts are getting sent back to Ghana #but only on loan #also its not all museums but it is the big ones with the most stuff #like the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum #uk politics #stolen artifacts #looting #ig #cost they were looted

[blueiskewl]

Looted Ancient Green Sarcophagus Returned to Egypt from US

An ancient wooden sarcophagus that was featured at the Houston Museum of Natural Sciences was returned to Egypt after U.S. authorities determined it was looted years ago, Egyptian officials said Monday.

The repatriation is part of Egyptian government efforts to stop the trafficking of its stolen antiquities. In 2021, authorities in Cairo succeeded in getting 5,300 stolen artifacts returned to Egypt from across the world.

Mostafa Waziri, the top official at the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said the sarcophagus dates back to the Late Dynastic Period of ancient Egypt, an era that spanned the last of the Pharaonic rulers from 664 B.C. until Alexander the Great's campaign in 332 B.C.

The sarcophagus, almost 3 meters (9.5 feet) tall with a brightly painted top surface, may have belonged to an ancient priest named Ankhenmaat, though some of the inscription on it has been erased, Waziri said.

It was symbolically handed over at a ceremony Monday in Cairo by Daniel Rubinstein, the U.S. chargé d'affaires in Egypt.

The handover came more than three months after the Manhattan District Attorney's Office determined the sarcophagus was looted from Abu Sir Necropolis, north of Cairo. It was smuggled through Germany into the United States in 2008, according to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg.

"This stunning coffin was trafficked by a well-organized network that has looted countless antiquities from the region," Bragg said at the time. "We are pleased that this object will be returned to Egypt, where it rightfully belongs."

Bragg said the same network had smuggled a gilded coffin out of Egypt that was featured at New York's Metropolitan Museum. Met bought the piece from a Paris art dealer in 2017 for about $4 million. It was returned to Egypt in 2019.

#Looted Ancient Sarcophagus Returned to Egypt from US #stolen antiquities #stolen artifacts #Abu Sir Necropolis #Late Dynastic Period #ancient artifacts #archeology #archeolgst #history #history news #ancient history #ancient culture #ancient civilizations #ancient egypt #egyptian history

[mando-lore]

#the british museum #british museum #stolen artifacts #imperialism

[covenawhite66]

Frank Star Comes Out, recently elected president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, sent a letter to Guns of History, Inc. requesting the withdrawal from auction of 111 item Lakota items.

Lakota items:including a square drum, a bone dancing stick, a set of beaded buffalo horns, a ceremonial pipe, and a variety of weapons and objects, including a rattle attributed to Hunkpapa Lakota leader Sitting Bull who lead his people in resistance against United States government policies and incursions into the Black Hills of what is now known as South Dakota. The catalogue also contains weapons alleged to have belonged to Oglala leaders Crazy Horse, who led a counterattack against Lt. Colonel George Custer’s 7th Cavalry, and Red Cloud, who defeated the US during Red Cloud’s War.

#native american #native american art #stolen artifacts #Lakota #stolen art #auction #native history #battle of the little bighorn #sitting bull

[nanasketchdump]

South africans really do not give a fuck hey, the radio host dj on one of the most popular radio channels just said 'In today's news; the Brittish museum, filled with thousands of stolen artifacts from other countries, have just fired an employee for stealing artifacts'

On air: the British museum, who are thieves, just fired a thief

#shes not wrong and i love her #south africa #british museum #stolen artifacts

[ausetkmt]

The Rosetta Stone has been in the hands of the British since the early 1800s. But now Egyptians say they want it back. Repatriate Rashid, an online petition started by a group of Egyptian archeologists, is calling for the British Museum to return the ancient artifact to its rightful owners.

As the petition points out, Egypt was controlled by the Turkish Empire and was not in control of its cultural heritage at the time the four foot granite stone was taken from them. Therefore, the stone and other artifacts the Brits took back then are not rightfully theirs.

The petition states:

“The Rosetta stone was undeniably a spoil of war and an act of plunder that was outlawed in the 17th and 19th centuries. The presence of these artifacts in the British Museum to this day supports past colonial endeavors of cultural violence and deprives Egypt as the country of origin of not only the physical return of these objects but also of their important role as Egyptian cultural heritage that spans a millennia of rich history.”

The Rosetta stone is a piece of a larger stone slab with a message carved into it about King Ptolemy V. But because that message was inscribed in three different scripts, including Ancient Greek, the stone became an important tool to help scientists decode hieroglyphics.

The stone was “discovered” by Napoleon’s army in 1799. But when the French surrendered Egypt to Britain in 1801, the Treaty of Alexandria gave them the stone and other artifacts along with it.

As the petition points out, returning the stone and other artifacts to Egypt is a major step in righting the wrongs of the past. “History can’t be changed, but it can be corrected. And despite the withdrawal of political, military, and governmental rule of the British Empire from Egypt over a century ago, decolonisation is far from being over.”

#Rosetta Stone #Emerald Tablets #Hieroglyphics #Egypt #Britain stole the Rosetta Stone for the museum #napoleon's lil theifin ass #stolen legacy #stolen artifacts #return our stolen artifacts #colonializations thefts #the Fake Treaty of Alexandria

[legocactus]

i want a gritty action film about a team reclaiming greek artifacts from the british museum. call it acropolis now

#british museum #stolen artifacts

[pppaperwork]

Cultural Patrimony and the War in Ukraine

I have been looking into the repatriation of artworks like the Parthenon marbles, and Benin Bronzes. It has been eye opening to see how many artifacts have been stolen or looted from their countries of origin, especially by Britain and the U.S.

Earlier this month when I began writing this post it was going to be focused on a marauder-style looting of Scythian Gold from art museums in Melitopol and Mariupol, Ukraine by Russian forces in April of this year. But, just two weeks ago at the beginning of November there was yet another tremendous raiding at the Kherson Art Museum in Southern Ukraine. The Russians destroyed many businesses, churches, homes, and cultural sites in the raid where much of the loot was found as Museum staff and community members tried to preserve it. As aforementioned, this is not the first strike Soviet forces have made on Ukrainian Art and Cultural institutions, those who understood the cultural significance of the items tried to save them. The museum was home to hundreds of paintings dating back to the 17th Century. Shortly after the raid, Soviets withdrew from the Southern Ukrainian city of Kherson in retreat with vans full of thousands of priceless artifacts.

These stolen paintings and artifacts are a part of a larger, darker tactic to scrub Ukrainians, Belarusians, Poles, and other Eastern Europeans of their cultural heritage and independence. Art is only the tip of the iceberg unfortunately, this month's raids included the vandalism and removal of 200 year old holy remains from their resting place in one of the 250+ Orthodox and Christian churches destroyed since the war began. Not to mention the homes, businesses, technology, national monuments and written history that have been lost. This is Ethnic cleansing and it is a war crime, these pieces must be returned to Ukraine.

The Scythian gold is one of the more pressing issues of this Museum theft, though. We're talking about approximately 198 solid gold artifacts, jewelry, ornaments, weapons, armor, and sculptures dating back over 2300 years, stolen, and not because they were just stumbled upon either. Similarly to how the staff at the Kherson Museum tried to hide and preserve the artwork, the staff at the Melitopol Museum tried even harder. In a New York Times interview in April, Museum Director Leila Ibrahimova describes hiding the Scythian Gold in cardboard boxes in a cellar or basement at the first signs of Russian Militarization in Melitopol back in February. About a month later, Ibrahimova recounted being kidnapped from her home with a black bag on her head for hours of intense questioning by Russian forces. She did not give in and was released, promptly fleeing Melitopol for somewhere not under Russian control. It was another month after that when a different museum employee was put at gunpoint for the Scythian Gold, she did not lead them but they found the boxes anyway.

The next day, in Kyiv, the Mayor of Melitopol gave an enraged press announcement that Ukraine's Scythian gold was gone with the Russians and no one had its whereabouts any longer.

Scythian Gold describes a type of gold sculpture or artifact from the 7-3 Century BCE, made by Scythian or nomadic people in a geographic "band" across the Pontic-Caspian Steppe from around Romania, west through Siberia. This is one of the most sought-after collections of artwork by museums throughout history, known for its rich origins and cultural backgrounds. Scythian gold is also said to be the purest gold there is, and it has disambiguations in the context of alchemy, mythology, and religion as well. It has been reported by multiple sources, although not confirmed, that select pieces of Scythian gold that were stolen from the Melitopol Museum have hit the stolen art market online and underground for bidding. All I can say is it's a shame and I am feeling very sorry for those living in Ukraine and the generations of war, violence, natural disasters, and ethnic cleansing they have faced.

In that initial research into stolen ancient art I mentioned, I noticed that most of the articles and hot-button issues coming up were focusing on Western European countries (UK, Spain, France), stealing from prehistoric cultures around the world. It's interesting to me as a student who had weekly field trips to LOCAL (Northeastern U.S. ) art museums and saw plenty of ancient "tribal" art and cultural and religious artifacts from across the globe, that the U.S. apparently acquired all of it ethically. I digress, I just thought it was worth mentioning that a suspiciously small amount of info on stolen art in the Americas was available.

#art #art history #stolen art #stolen artifacts #ancient art #archeology #prehistoric #prehistoric art #ukraine #russia #ukraine war #looting #south ukraine #britain #british museum #fascisim #ethnic cleansing #cultural erasure #Scythian gold #middle east art #kherson #kherson retreat #kherson museum #melitopol

[andean-deer]

hey guys in the future...

please don't make jokes about theft of north, central, south american artifacts. i take it a bit more seriously and you should too.

BUT it's not that deep? don't care, won't care.

a similar post was floating around where someone suggested that modern day archaeologists should dress like they do in the movies...

long story short it has colonial associations, the wak'akuna (artifacts) are not just objects to be paraded, plundered or possessed.

hey, indiana jones... you're on thin ice.

so much has been stolen to the point that museums will assign many countries as the origin just so it seems more legitimate. but the honest truth is they can barely tell where it's from. the context of western hemisphere indigenous artifacts has been lost so frequently because of grave robbers, antiquities smuggling, and underhanded deals between sketchy yet well-known people (ex: hiram bingham iii).

#personal #long post #asking nicely #stolen artifacts #reblogs are ok* #im fine with comments* #feel free to add on #small psa

[kierancampire]

And we'd do it again

#personal #British #Britain #British museum #British artifacts #Stolen artifacts

[flamingthespian]

#um actually #brennan lee mulligan #tal talks #i just watched this today and thought this bit was so good lmao #i for one would love a reverse Indiana Jones who breaks into museums and re-steals stolen artifacts to bring them back to their home culture #AND gets with really old women

[covenawhite66]

The remains of more than 100,000 Native Americans are held by prestigious U.S. institutions, despite a 1990 law meant to return them to tribal nations.

Ten institutions hold about half of the Native American remains that have not been returned to tribes.

As of last month, about 200 institutions — including the University of Kentucky’s William S. Webb Museum of Anthropology and the nonprofit Center for American Archeology in Kampsville, Illinois — had repatriated none of the remains of more than 14,000 Native Americans in their collections. Some institutions with no recorded repatriations possess the remains of a single individual; others have as many as a couple thousand.

“Native Americans have always been the object of study instead of real people,

#native american #museum #native stolen property #tribes #native stolen human remains #museum repatriation #stolen artifacts

[justafanwarrior]

DP x DC Prompt #1

An old collection is finally shown again at the British Museum after being left in boxes for a few decades.

By coincidence one Tucker Foley, reincarnation of a Pharaoh, notices among the collection several items that used to belong to him. It doesn't take much (or anything) to convince Sam and Danny to go on a... Field trip yup field trip with him to London, a little vacation for his 24th birthday if you will. What do you mean his birthday isn't before several months? That's blasphemy.

They simply came during the day as to control the perimeter (and make a list of other artefacts that would suddenly be returned to their rightful place.)

They could not have planned that one Ra's Al Ghul also had several of his own personal items that he wished to retrieve among the very same collection. Or that he would decide to not only get them back himself but also at the same time.

#dp x dc #dpxdc #dc x dp #dcxdp #Ra's was bored and decided to do the heist himself #he did notice the 3 young adults checking the perimeter at the same time as him in the afternoon #ending up doing the heist *with* them wasn't planned #but he did have fun #everlasting trio #a certain statue will soon be returned to her sisters #among many other artifacts that the countries will fight tooth and nail to keep now that they have them back #Ra's is just as surprised as anybody else that he ends up befriending the 3 #the 4 of them end up planning a few other heists throughout the year on several other museums #all museums that refuse to restitute the stolen artifacts #c: ra's al ghul #the everlasting trio are all some kind of powerful entity on their own #they're just causing chaos while in vacation they're not like active villains or anything

[vampirictranssexual]

Okay, serious discussion about s5e7 of wwdits. I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. The creatures fell into the uncanny valley, why did they choose the donut lady as a plot for nadja when it could've been with the guide, etc. HOWEVER, what I do appreciate about this episode is the meta commentary on how Nandor's culture is simultaneously erased in history classes and then mocked by museums. His culture, his writings, his garments.. almost everything about his history is completely misrepresented by the museum and all of his artifacts were stolen. He literally sees a pair of his underwear on display! He is looked at as an object, a relic of the past. The museum portays him as being unintelligent and frowns upon his writings. And that's based on their narrow understanding of him, Al Q, and his culture. The historians do not know Nandor of course, but they view him through a lense that chooses to only see him and his culture as unintelligent, subhuman even- because why else would someone write something like this? Or wear something like this? Or use weapons like this? It reminds me of those TV shows that theorize the pyramids were made by aliens. Because how else could the Egyptians have been capable of creating the pyramids? Surely they can't be intelligent enough! *eye roll*

Idk someone could probably use better words to communicate what I'm trying to say here, but I wanted to bring it to the table anyway. Oh, also Colin becomes the center of attention by acting like the stereotypical white professor who is more focused on feeding their ego than actually educating his pupils. And this ends up in Nandor being pushed out of the conversation. A literal metaphor for how whiteness obscures and diminishes other cultures and immigrant communities. Of course Colin did that just to feed off of the students. Because then he ends up replacing the museum display with a more accurate representation of Nandor (albeit for comedic effect). And then by taking back his horsie necklace. But.. everyone listened to Colin! And ignored Nandor! Lots to think about in terms of erasure, white washing, forced assimilation, how museums profit off of stolen artifacts and skewing history, etc.

Nandor is an immigrant to Staten island and he was forced to assimilate. Imagine how he must feel when he sees all these stolen artifacts in the museum, and plaques that inaccurately portray his culture and history. And people gawking at the clothes and weapons he proudly wore/still wears. This is a reality for many native and immigrant communities here in America and abroad. Being forced to view your culture, your way of life through the lense of the oppressor.

#maybe im being too meta but i appreciate the writers for pointing out how museums/professors/institutions profit off stolen artifacts #and profit off of minimizing/erasing other cultures in a way that benefits whiteness #ultimately colin was an ally to nandor by fixing the museum so that it accurately portrayed Nandor #and by taking back his stolen horsie necklace. big win for the colin/nandor arc #wwdits #wwdits spoilers #what we do in the shadows #its a funny show! i know. just. let me sit with my thoughts lol