Safe Antiquities: Witschonke Accuses Gill

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US Coiney Rick Witschonke is moaning about the Italian police not letting the general public see all the evidence they have gathered in the course of a complex ongoing investigation. They had posted part of the archive of photos they had discovered in the earlier stages of investigating the "Medici Affair". Collectors and dealers are now complaining that these photos are now unavailable (if they were so concerned, they should have downloaded them when they were). Witschonke reads into that motives that do not exist and - such are coineys - lashes out with an accusation:

The Italians cynically pulled down the Medici images they had posted when they decided they could get more press mileage out of surprising innocent collectors and auction houses who happen to acquire one of the pieces in the photos. And they then provided you with a full set of these images so that you could assist them - a fact you refuse to acknowledge. So now you smugly admonish collectors and dealers to more carefully research the provenance of objects before acquiring them, while hypocritically withholding important information that would facilitate that research.

What an astounding text. What evidence does Witschonke have that Gill physically holds this archive? Where? In Swansea, in his home or office, maybe behind a panel disguised as a bookcase? Given the heavy duties of his teaching programme, who maintains order in and helps sort through this archive for him, two long legged Czech blonde interns maybe? I think Witschonke should pay more attention to what Dr Gill says before coming out with such nonsense.

So, I would like to ask Witschonke, how does one "happen to buy" one of these pieces, and if you have bought one how does that make you an "innocent collector" or "innocent auction house"? Surely the question of due diligence comprises a little more of checking an object is not in a picture of one major antiquities dealer that was by chance caught doing dodgy business, but whether a particular artefact has a verifiable collecting history which excludes it having been involved in any dodgy transactions (at least back to before - say - 1970), those that the police are investigating, and those they may not be. If they've bought things without doing the requisite research into the chain of ownership (collecting history) themselves, why should they be "surprised" to find that some of the objects in their collection turn out to have been of tainted provenance?

There is surely a bit more to safe sex than asking a pickup on the way home if any of their previous partners had died of an HIV-related disease.
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