Collectors Beware: Unpapered Ukrainian Cultural Property Could be Subject to Confiscation

 

                            Controversial coin (MPR)                        

In another example of an attempt to rewrite history by manipulation of the physical remains, museums and public collections in the Russian Federation have been told to remove from display and destroy a whole series of medieval silver coins bearing letters of the Ukrainian alphabet. These coins struck under local rulers from Dmitro Donskiy in the 1360s up to Ivan IV bear inscriptions in an early form of Ukrainian (identifiable for example by the letter "i" - absent from the Cyrillic script of early Russian, which has "и" in its place). This is in line with the current position of the Russian Federation that Ukraine is some kind of imagined, or non-existent nationality with no real past. These coins seem to project a different message, which is why an attempt is being made to remove them from public view. 

In this period, there are three denominations (kopek, denga and polushka) struck on irregular flans made by flattening pre-cut lengths of silver wire (so-called 'wire money'). This was  a technique adopted from the coinage of the Golden Horde to whom the rulers of Muscovy were originally vassal (1240-1480). The legend Царь, великий князь Іван всієї Русі translates as 'Ivan, Tsar and Great Prince of the Rus', referring to the state founded in Kyiv, 'Mother of Cities'.  Though tiny and difficult to locate, these coins are often found by metal detecting, and a lot of the ones on western markets come from artefact hunters in Ukraine, almost all of them illegally exported. 

The Kremlin-allied interest group 'Molodezh za Russkaya Pravda' (MRP) is pressurising lawmakers to legislate more strongly to enforce the creation and maintenance of a unified historical narrative covering the historical heritage of the Russian Federation, and to extend this to fighting variant views coming from "unfriendly countries" abroad. These small silver coins have become embroiled in this struggle as they raise the question of the rise of the northern forest-zone state of Muscovy, and the much older multi-ethnic state of Kyivan Rus in the south. 

Unclear at this stage is the reality behind the rhetoric about how MRP activists will be seeking to apply these measures to items in foreign collections and on sale by foreign dealers that have left their country of origin without the required export paperwork. It could be that attempts will be made to trace and confiscate items that were acquired from online sales unaccompanied by the proper export paperwork required to make them legally on the antiquities trade.  Yet another reason why collectors should ensure they only buy material with the proper paperwork.