|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
British Museums Face Demands For Cultural Relics
By Kevin McElderry LONDON, (AFP) - Some are the spoils of war. Others were stolen and smuggled away. Still others were given as presents, or even -- a rarity, this -- paid for. They are the cultural relics of Britain's imperial past: the treasures and artifacts acquired in the days London merrily dispatched troops, bureaucrats and scientists to conquer and civilize the world. But now the descendants of their original owners are lining up to ask for them back. A British parliamentary committee has spent the past six months looking at the vexed issue and will issue a report at the end of July. Top of the list are the Elgin Marbles. The friezes were prized from the Parthenon in Athens, bought from Greece's Ottoman rulers in a debatable transaction, sold to the British government and deposited in the British Museum in 1816. Athens, looking to the 2004 Olympic Games, wants them back, describing them as the greatest national symbol of Greece. "No chance," says London. It would be "a betrayal of trust," the British Museum warns, "to establish a precedent for the piecemeal dismemberment of (its) collections." The museum, which retains exhibits from Egyptian mummies to archaeological treasures from ancient Persia, would arguably have most to lose. In any case, its philanthropic founders drew up a charter barring it from getting rid of any original object. That would also apply to the Rosetta Stone, whose inscriptions led to the translation of Egyptian hieroglyphics. It was war loot twice over, taken by a French captain in 1799 and ceded to Britain two years later. Egypt's leading antiquities experts want it back, but to their ire, Cairo has indicated it will not pursue the claim. Meanwhile, scattered around various museums in Britain and Europe are the Benin bronzes, a set of casts dating from the 16th century. They were seized in 1897 as war loot in the Nigerian city-state of Benin. Tribal chiefs insist their "deep historic and social value" outweighs any aesthetic or commercial value they hold in exile. And Indian MPs want the unique 12th-century Koh-i-Noor diamond back, plus other treasures looted or bought up under the British raj. "It is a sign of a country asserting itself and saying, 'this is my past, my history, this is who I am.' That's quite significant," said Liz Robertson of the Museums Association. "The difficulty is in putting today's interpretation on what happened 200 years ago."Who, for example, could say that what was totally legitimate when Britain ruled half the world now had to be compensated for? Experts say cases should be examined on their own merits, depending on how the object was acquired, what would happen if it were returned and whether it would remain on public display. Some Benin bronzes returned to Nigeria later appeared on the international art market -- hardly inspiring confidence in museums asked to give them up. Yet many items are already being returned. A Scottish coronation stone seized by invading English forces in 1296 was formally returned to Edinburgh four years ago, exactly 700 years later. In 1997, a museum in Exeter, southwest England, returned the bracelet and necklace worn by a Tasmanian Aborigine, and in 1998 Maori tattooed heads were sent back to New Zealand from Edinburgh University. Last year, Glasgow handed back the shirt of a Lakota Sioux warrior killed at the Battle of Wounded Knee in 1890, and had previously returned Aboriginal human remains. Glasgow Museum's director Mike O'Neill said he faced other demands for the return of Benin bronzes, the bog-enclosed corpse of a Scottish murder victim and a Sioux waistcoat. "There's obviously prestige attached to having certain objects," Robertson said.
Art & Entertainment |
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
