Salvaged Treasure Headed Back to Spain

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In the US, a federal judge has ordered deep sea salvage company Odyssey Marine Exploration (OMEX.O) to turn over to the Spanish government within a week the $500 million worth of Spanish coins it recovered in 2007 from the wreck of the Spanish ship Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes off the coast of Portugal. This ruling by U.S. Magistrate Mark Pizzo brings to an end the five-year legal battle between Odyssey and Spain over the 594,000 gold and silver coins. The Nuestra Senora was sunk by the British in an 1804 battle. Spain has never relinquished ownership of the vessel and its cargo, which is why (according to the Law of the Sea the salvage company cannot claim it). The ship was also a gravesite for the Spanish sailors who lost their lives in the battle.

A U.S. judge ruled in Spain's favor last year, and Odyssey Marine's appeals were rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this month. The coins have been held in a storage facility at an undisclosed location in Florida. Pizzo said Odyssey Marine must provide an inventory of the coins to Spain by Tuesday and turn over custody of the coins by February 24. Spain will have to pay for the shipping costs.

I am glad that it has turned out that way, despite the time it took. The circumstances surrounding the issue of the original salvage licence, the way Odyssey deliberately misinformed everybody where the wreck lay at the time the discovery was announced (only after the loot was safely in the USA) are nothing short of shameful. Wholly inexplicable is how the British authorities in Gibraltar became part of the heist (as now it can be called) by allowing the loot to pass through Gibraltar on its way to the US absolutely unchallenged before its ownership was determined. Spain should now ask Great Britain for an explanation, if the British had impounded these coins, fellow EU member Spain would not have had to waste five years on court cases in the US to get their property back.

Vignette: Gibraltar, where the monkeys live.

Treasure Headed Back to Spain, Underwater Treasure Hunters "Driven Underground"?

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The decision that Odyssey Marine Exploration has to surrender the cargo of the Spanish ship Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes to its owners, Spain by February 24 was slammed by the salvage companies lawyers.

The company will abide by the ruling, even though it "flies in the face of all legal precedent," Melinda MacConnel, vice president and general counsel of Odyssey Marine, told reporters after the hearing. MacConnel said the ruling "undermined" the jurisdiction of U.S. courts in naval affairs, and complained that Washington had influenced the case in Spain's favor. "Clearly, the political influences in this case overshadowed the law," she said. The ruling would also discourage other treasure hunters from reporting their finds, she added. "The items will be hidden or even worse, melted down or sold on eBay," she said.

well, golly, Washington is concerned about how deeds done out there by US citizens is going to affect the international position of the USA? How awful. How awful for US Treasure hunters who want to go out there and rob war graves belonging to another country for gold and silver coins to sell on the open - US - market for a huge profit. As for US courts not having jurisdiction over property of another country outside the borders of US territory, how odd, eh? Hands up, who thought the Americans owned the entire world? Have a look into the details of how (and where) Odyssey gained the salvage licence in the first place and how they tried to hide the date (it was announced as a "colonial period wreck") and location, and thus identity of the ship.

But, look what other argument crawls slimily out of the woodwork here. If US courts do not give underwater grave robbers all the property they find there belonging to other people, Melinda MacConnel argues that grave robbers are not going to report what they hoik out in future. Let us recall that Odyssey is not some two-bit mom and pop treasure hunting outfit. It was set up to be a legal enterprise doing everything to the letter of the law, and profiting from the sale of legally acquired artefacts. That there is already a black market of illicitly and illegally acquired shipwreck-derived antiquities out there is not denied by anyone. MacConnel's argument is just the same as the UK metal detectorists ("if you make everybody adhere to standards of responsibility, all you'll do is drive the hobby underground") and the US no-questions-asked sellers and buyers of dugup antiquities ("if you make everybody adhere to standards of responsibility, all you'll do is drive the hobby underground"). Now Odyssey is claiming that if you make everybody salvaging material from historic wrecks adhere to standards of responsibility (like sort out the ownership issues before you begin work, not after), this will drive the business underground.

"Alabama Needs Our Help"

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Steve, Forrest and Spencer Phillips (Southern Skin Diver Supply of Birmingham, Alabama) ask US metal detectorists to support an amendment they have proposed to Alabama's archaeological resource protection legislation ("Please Support SB-81. Save our lost history..." - "Save" it that is by taking it away and adding it to a private collection). Militant anti-preservationist Dick Stout of Texas reckons its a good idea to help out, "these folks need our help and they need it fast. It will involve emailing quite a few state reps, but you can easily do that by copying your letter, and simply pasting it when contacting them. Let's get on it...".

The background to this effort is that Steven Phillips is reportedly the only person to ever have been arrested under the Alabama Cultural Resources Act:

At trial, Phillips was found not guilty of felony theft of a cultural resource but was convicted of misdemeanor third-degree theft. The charge stemmed from Phillips' 2003 expedition in the Alabama River near Selma in search of Civil War relics, which ended with his arrest and the confiscation of a Civil War era rifle he'd found.

So, it looks like (Selma here for example) we have another case of somebody looking for collectables on a battlefield/site of conflict. And the metal detectorists of the US rallying behind such people asserting their "rights" (no mention of responsibilities) to plunder such sites of collectables such as rifles.

Steve, Forrest and Spence write that the new bill, SB-81, they have introduced in the Alabama Senate "will make the current law easier to understand". They have deleted three words from the definition of Cultural Resources. What in fact they intend doing is to remove any artefacts not part of a shipwreck from any form of protection in public-owned waterways. Note that in the new wording, Treasure trove which is not associated with a shipwreck is NOT protected from Treasure hunters working outside the permit system, hoiking it out and flogging it off would be legal under the amended law (Section 41-9-292 of the Code of Alabama 1975). The navigable waterways contain however much more than shipwrecks, artefacts lost, dropped, discarded, deposited for ritual purposes in antiquity or historical times. They may be traces of activities in the past using the rivers, they may be elements of sites on the river banks now submerged, there may be artefacts embedded in anthropogenic layers containing well-preserved organic materials which will be disturbed if divers start excavating for collectable items. they may be artefacts lying in situ from when they were dropped in the past during a documented event, such as an historic battle (like the battle of Selma for example). The proposed amendments to the bill aim to render the disturbance of these artefacts and their context legal and the artefacts themselves up for grabs by metal detectorists and unregulated divers. Permits would only be needed for removing collectables from (known) historic shipwrecks. (In any case what precisely does "associated with a shipwreck" mean in legal terms? Not defined in the proposed amendment)

Here are the amendments proposed to SB-81 (file 'aucrap')

Like Bangor's Raimund Karl discussed at the beginning of the month, and the other supporters of the PAS, Mr Philips thinks preservation is all about "finding things":

Divers should find isolated items and save as much of our lost history as possible, and we need them to not be afraid to tell what they find because they fear harassment. Significant finds will be made in the future and we all want to learn from these finds. Other states have friendly dive laws that encourage divers to search and share what they have found, and we don't want Alabama divers to feel they must keep their finds secret.

The finds-seeking divers are incensed that "some of the professional archaeologists and their cronies" have been "emailing and calling the Senators and Representatives asking them to kill our bill". The same tired old arguments are used to justify this: "These items are rusting and eroding away and need saving", "We are the public and the public waters are ours individually as much as theirs", "Items that are found are often placed in museums", "All reference books identifying relics and artifacts have been written by authors using collectors", "We don’t want grants or contracts as the professionals try to get for anything they do". Note how they shift from being "divers who find things" ("finders" in PAS-speak) to "collectors" between the beginning of the page and its middle.

As Thomas Spencer reports:

Teresa Paglione, president of the Alabama Archaeological Society, said without legal protections, artifacts from the Civil War, the settlement of the state, the age of European exploration and thousands of years of Native American history could be extracted, kept privately or sold, and lost to history. Those artifacts in state waters belong to all the people of the state, Paglione said. "(The changes to the law) would allow divers like Mr. Phillips to conduct little more than scavenger hunts for relics -- like a game of finders-keepers, except individuals get to keep what belongs to the state of Alabama and its citizenry," she said.

It seems gold-prospectors with metal detectors are about as bright as those who use them to hunt coins etc: "This affects gold prospecting as well" declares a poster on the Gold Prospectors Association of America Forum. He seems not to have actually read the proposed amendment and its definition of "artifact" as the subject of the legislation. So, no, no it does NOT. I expect gold prospectors will be writing in ignorant droves nevertheless, not having read the document either and thinking it through.

Note the name of the archaeology-insensitive proposer of the Alabama collectors' rights bill: Senator Cam Ward (R) [pictured above from his website]. He has apparently been told that there are "100 000" find-hungry divers in Alabama and obviously counting on their vote if he can get this archaeology wrecking bill through - hang the cost to the heritage.

Perhaps the resolution here is not to redefine archaeological artefacts to a much narrower field to allow their legal and unregulated harvesting for collection and sale by artefact hunters and collectors, but - as I pointed out in the case Raimund Karl was discussing - to make it easier - and broaden the scope of those eligible - for those whose real intent is to increase our knowledge of sites to obtain the requisite permits.

Sources:
Thomas Spencer, 'New Alabama law could mean finders-keepers for historic artifacts found underwater', The Birmingham News , January 16, 2012.

Public Lands and Waters, Southern Skin Divers Supply: Blog of the South's oldest dive store, 1/21/2012.

Treasure Hunters' Lobbyists Rebuffed

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The Florida-based treasure hunting firm Odyssey Marine Explorations are not doing too well in their struggle to appropriate the loot (17 tons of gold and silver Spanish coins, $500 million worth) which they so secretively raised from an early nineteenth century Atlantic shipwreck (believed to be the single richest bounty yet recovered from the sea). They needed just a small tweak in the House version of the defense bill - "just two words and two commas" - to make it easier to get their hands on the loot.

The little-noticed proposal became the focus of a quintessential Washington lobbying battle waged almost entirely behind closed doors, with the potential fate of hundreds of millions of dollars in booty hanging in the balance. The change in language, pushed by the company's lobbyists and a group of Florida lawmakers, alarmed the Spanish government and the Obama administration, which said it feared the impact it might have on the treatment of other sunken warships, which are viewed as both archaeological sites and hallowed graves. In the end, the arguments backed by the two governments prevailed, with the proposed shipwreck language stricken from a final conference bill approved by House and Senate negotiators last week.

Good, the behaved scandalously over the ship they tried back in 2007 to convince us all was somewhere else and had a different name from the "Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes" (they called it the "Black Swan"). It is still not clear how British authorities in Gibraltar allowed them to land the loot and then export it to the USA. The truth however came out, and the company, instead of selling the loot off to eagerly-awaiting collectors and paying off their profit-greedy investors, has been battling for custody of the treasure in U.S. federal courts. These have repeatedly sided with Spain, Peru and 25 descendants of those aboard the Mercedes, deciding the frigate is protected under sovereign immunity laws (much of the legal stuff is covered by Kimberley Alderman on her blog).

The most recent setback for Odyssey came this month, when the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals declined to revisit a previous ruling.[...] As the court fight dragged on, however, Odyssey and its Washington lobbying firm, Jenkins Hill Consulting, embarked on an alternate path to help Odyssey's case: a wording change to a 2004 law called the Sunken Military Craft Act. At issue is a section of the law defining "sunken military craft".

The case seems to have been dealt with by Scott Barnhart of Jenkins Hill, who has helped Republican politicians in their campaigns and lobbied for tobacco companies. Odyssey wanted to persuade some US Congressmen to take their side and get the wording changed in their favour, thus rendering wreck sites like that of the "Mercedes" open for private salvage. The move failed, prompting from their lobbyist the same type of remark we are used to hearing from those who try to profit from the sale of other material derived from the dismantling of archaeological sites: "This administration continues to make it difficult for U.S. businesses to operate and succeed". ("Succeed" in what Mr Barnhart?)

The dispute over the Mercedes is part of a broader, global debate over control of undersea treasure, which has become far easier to locate and retrieve with the help of robots and other advanced technology.

Is the US willing to take the global moral lead in helping protect this valuable resource from destructive commercial exploitation? Or will the lobbyists get their way with easily-swayed US Congressmen?

Source: Dan Eggan, 'Treasure hunters battle for $500 million bounty', Washington Post, Dec. 15, 2011

Smithsonian Shipwreck Show Scuppered

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According to Kate Taylor ('Shipwreck Show Postponed', New York Times June 28, 2011):

The Smithsonian Institution has indefinitely postponed its plans to mount an exhibition of Chinese artifacts salvaged from a shipwreck because of opposition from archeologists who say the objects were collected by a commercial treasure hunter in a manner that violated professional standards. The exhibition, “Shipwrecked: Tang Treasures and Monsoon Winds,” was tentatively scheduled for next spring at the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, the Smithsonian’s Asian art museums.

It is apparently not off the cards indefinitely, the Museum says it might mount a “Shipwrecked” exhibit perhaps two years from now, giving time for the museums’ director, Julian Raby "time to address some of the archeologists’ concerns" (what's he going to do, make the salvage company put the stuff back and excavate it properly with more attention to detail this time? Sadly with archaeological sites you can't do that, once it's gone, it's gone - which is what the point is.)

The salvage company has said it mined the artifacts quickly to avoid looting.

That's like teenage joyriders stealing a Rolls Royce so a hoodlum doesn't.

Kudos to the Smithsonian for reversing its earlier decision and taking the moral lead over the exploitation of underwater archaeological sites simply as "Treasure".

AIA Statement on Smithsonian Treasure Exhibition

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AIA Statement on Belitung

June 8, 2011 | by Elizabeth Bartman

As the largest and oldest organization devoted to archaeology in North America, the Archaeological Institute of America is committed to the protection of the world’s cultural heritage. As part of this commitment we strongly oppose the commercial salvage of antiquities and any exploitation of archaeological materials obtained in this manner.

The Belitung Shipwreck was salvaged unscientifically by commercially-motivated treasure hunters. Although the excavation and disposition of these materials may be technically “legal,” it is the AIA’s position that involvement by the Smithsonian Institution in the exhibition of these artifacts will serve to blur the distinction between bona fide nautical archaeology and treasure hunting. Following this path puts the Smithsonian in the indefensible position of aiding those who believe that antiquities are a commodity to be mined for personal or corporate financial gain. They are not—they are part of the world’s cultural patrimony.

As the premier museum of the United States and the largest museum and research institution in the world, the Smithsonian is a model for others and should endorse the highest ethical standards for American archaeological and museological practice. The AIA urges the Smithsonian’s leadership to heed the voices of archaeologists worldwide—including many within its own walls—in cancelling the plans for any exhibition of the Belitung shipwreck and its artifacts. To proceed with plans to display these objects will increase the risk to other equally valuable shipwrecks that have yet to be discovered.

Elizabeth Bartman
President, AIA

It is interesting to compare this with the near total lack of reaction by British archaeological organizations to the plans last year to produce a Treasure-based "archaeology" TV programme by the PAS.

The Smithsonian, Sock Puppets and Commercial Salvage

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Jennifer on Blogger since "June 2011" [and only one view of her ("unavailable") profile - mine] looks to me to be a sock puppet. She sent a comment to my text on the Smithsonian pretending to be reconsidering its involvement in the "Shipwrecked: Tang Treasures and Monsoon Winds" exhibition. [This seems to be the Washington institution's dismissive answer to criticism of the ethics behind its exhibition]. Anyway, "Jennifer" wrote:

"I found the paper published by Michael Flecker regarding the difficulties surrounding excavations in developing countries (particuarly in S.E Asia) in the International Journal of Nautical Archaeology in 2002 [...] Did you get a chance to read that? It makes me think that given the circumstances, use of a combined commercial and archeological programme for such excavations is the most realistic solution".

Yes, I have already read it. I'm not terribly impressed by its arguments. They are basically the same offered by commercial salvagers (read treasure hunters) everywhere. I assume "Jennifer B" will have read Hall's Fig and a Spade article which summarises them nicely. It is odd that the author really considers only the resolutions of the problem which suit his commercial backers. Basically what he's saying is we cannot protect sites like Angkor Wat from the looters, so what we have to do is dismantle it now ourselves and sell off the bits and use the money we make from it to conserve the bits - with a bit of profit for the government on the side. But of course, he argues, the situation in SE Asia is "exceptional" so that means it is not unethical to propose something like this... anything goes. Yeah, right.

"Jennifer" enthuses:

I do think that Tilman Walterfang took a good, ethical approach - considering the circumstances.

So is "Jennifer" in real life Flecker's girlfriend or Walterfang's?

I have nothing against archaeology being a commercial enterprise - that is after all how much European archaeology is funded these days. The key problem is whether and to what degree any compromise that is made compromises the archaeological principles or the commercial ones. So let's take a look at this "good ethical approach".

There's quite a lot in the Internet about the commercial salvage firm Seabed Explorations, a lot of it intended to promote the picture that its approach is a "good ethical" one. It seems at times to be trying too hard doesn't it?

So this is what it says about itself:

Seabed Explorations is dedicated to the discovery, excavation, conservation and exhibition of shipwrecks and artifacts of archeological significance that, at some time in history, have been lost to the oceans of Southeast Asia. The group, which has offices in Singapore and New Zealand, has been active in the field of maritime archaeology for over a decade. Seabed Explorations is a commercial enterprise that, in addition to a core team of specialists, employs distinguished scholars, undersea archeologists and restoration experts to assist with the care, management and authentication of finds discovered during our own salvage projects.

According to their website they've been involved in the excavation of at least three important wrecks in the space of just three years: the Intan Wreck (1997), the Maranei/Bakau Wreck (1998), and the Belitung (the Tang Wreck – Batu Hitam - 1998). No details are given of the publication of these projects or what else they've been up to since, though there is an undated photo on their website showing them "heading out to sea in Indonesia- on a preliminary reconnoissance dive; investigating a World War II shipwreck potentially consisting of a large collection of Asian antiquities". This artefact-centred approach is a theme that runs through all their publicity material. They give every appearance of being after the goodies, rather than the archaeological context:

Seabed Explorations works closely with governments in Southeast Asia to retrieve lost cultural relics for the benefit of scientists, historians and the public, and adheres to the highest technical standards of undersea excavation. We secure the rights to recover undersea artifacts from relevant authorities, and liaise with governments, at local and national levels, to comply with legal requirements regarding all salvage operations.

Again here:

Seabed Explorations utilizes established scientific processes and methodology to authenticate provenance of the artifacts, the vessel and its possible destinations.

I suppose that helps boost their retail value. And here:

Walterfang and his team can confidently conclude that they have the professional means and know-how to assist the governments and sovereign nations of the world in recovering lost treasures for forensic study and subsequent display.

Team Seabed Exploration states:

We are committed to making our finds available for study by historians, archeologists, anthropologists and other academics, as well as for viewing by the general public in the leading museums of the world whenever and wherever possible.

So these archaeologists only get involved when the finds have been hoiked out of the water? But how many archaeologists were involved in recording the complex three dimensional relationships of the timbers of the three wrecks? Actually in the water on site? How many diving hours were related to proper archaeological recording (to the "highest standards") as opposed to saleable-artefact recovery?

It is clear how many experienced archaeologists would have to be in a team recording the archaeological context of wrecks containing tens of thousands of individual pieces of information to the "highest technical standards of undersea excavation" and then work through the masses of documentation this would produce to write the final report of three wrecks. Maybe "Jennifer" knows how many archaeologists were in the Seabed Exploration team in 1977-8 and can tell us who they were. The only information I could find tells us that in 2004 there were only two archaeologists employed to work through the documentation of the three as-yet-unpublished wreck sites. Dr Flecker, who seems to have been involved in the second season on the Belitung but was no longer on the team a few years later, and has apparently managed to publish about nineteen pages on the wreck itself in preliminary articles in the JNA (here and here) which is hardly the level of detail of record one would expect from such an important site excavated to "highest technical standards of undersea excavation". Where is the rest?

Here is the line-up of Team Seabed Explorations New Zealand Ltd, in 2004
[1.] Tilman Walterfang, Director Seabed Explorations NZ Ltd.
[2.] Sabine Hahn, P.A. to Tilman Walterfang

Artefact Conservation team (preparing material for commercial display and sale)
[3] Andreas Rettel - Head of conservation
[4.] Laurenz Walterfang - conservation
[5.] Reimar Walterfang - Apprentice conservation
[6.] "Conservation, Roman German Museum in Mainz" (sic)
[7.] Florian B., conservation
[8.] Lesli Pluntke, Head of Ceramic Conservation Department of Roman German Museum in Mainz
[9.] Conservationist, Roman German Museum in Mainz (sic)

Archaeologists (dealing with the archaeological documentation)
[10.] Dr. Zoi Kotiza, Archaeologist
[11.] Dr. Alexandra Agapaki, Archaeologist

Others
[12.] Oli L. - "Apprentice"
[13.] Julina
[14.] Roland Dotschat, IT System Engineer
[15.] Jan. H., Electronic/ Mechanical Engineer

There are two things which strike you about this list. Two archies by themselves are not enough to prepare the final publication of three sites of this nature of complexity concurrently - and who are these guys anyway? Secondly what kind of organization is it that employs 'specialists' whose names they do not know alongside members of their own family? That does not look much like a "team of top specialists" to me.

So how can one describe what happened to the Belitung wreck (the one the Smithsonian exhibition is about)? Was it an archaeological project which is financed by exploiting the commercial value of the artefacts recovered ? Or was it a commercial treasure hunt cosmetically disguised as an archaeological project limited "by the circumstances"? To what degree would it be ethical for an archaeologist to take part knowingly and deliberately in the latter type of project? To what degree is it ethical for any institution to use its prestige to bolster the commercial success of such an operation (or does it not diminish the prestige of the institution to stoop to such acts)?

What, precisely, was being "preserved" here? Are we not faced again with the type of picture of archaeology currently actively being promoted in the UK by the "archaeological outreach" of the PAS - that archaeology is primarily about getting spectacular and tale-worthy artefacts out of the ground (here water) and into showcases to be gawped at? In both cases it is dressed up as "preservation", but each time it is an artefact-centred notion. IS archaeology really just about the artefacts, Indiana Jones grabbing stuff and pronouncing "this belongs in a museum!", and very little else? Or is it now very old-fashioned and out-of-touch of me to remember wistfully the days when I was a student and we were taught that it was very much more?

As far as the wreck and salvage firm in question goes, there are three more sycophantic and obvious sock-puppets under this wreck-hunters' editorial.

UPDATE 9/6/11
I see Peter Tompa has a post saying its "none of their [our] business" what the Indonesians do to the historic environment. In the same way then he'd probably argue its none of anybody's business either what they are allowing to happen to the tropical rainforest habitats under the pressure of the paper pulp industry. Surely however conservationist attempts to combat commercial pressure on environmental resources relies on the expression of international concern, especially when foreign business interests are involved in the destruction. Mattel and the Asian Paper and Pulp forest plunderers (their website goes out of its way to represent them as environmentally concerned) and the Smithsonian and the Antipodean wreck plunderers are precisely the same type of problem.

Mattel has (for) now stopped importing pulp from these sources and investigating where it comes from and the environmental impact of its actions as a result of the protests. The Smithsonian is not changing its policy decision. Nobody's business, or shouldn't we be speaking out?

Vignette: Sock puppet advocacy for salvage firm?

Smithsonian Ponders Ethics of Showing Treasures

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The Smithsonian has been planning to host an exhibition: “Shipwrecked: Tang Treasures and Monsoon Winds", showing the contents of an Indonesian shipwreck discovered by fishermen off Belitung Island in Indonesia in 1998. The problem is that instead of being properly investigated in a multi-disciplinary project according to established methodology, this historically important shipwreck was commercially mined within a period of months by a commercial treasure hunter, and thus much of the information it might have provided about the ship’s crew and cargo was lost. This has been likened, even in the US, to modern-day cultural piracy (Kate Taylor, 'Treasures Pose Ethics Issues for Smithsonian', New York Times, April 24, 2011).

The exhibition was conceived by the government of Singapore, which owns the artifacts, and Julian Raby, the director of the Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, the Smithsonian's two Asian art museums. It is on display in Singapore through July and will then travel internationally. Although the Smithsonian says it has not made a final decision, the exhibition — which includes glazed pottery, rare pieces of early blue-and-white porcelain and the largest gold cup ever found from the Tang Dynasty (618-907) — is tentatively set to arrive at the Sackler in the spring of 2012.[...] The ship, which is believed to be Arab, was filled with a cargo of ninth-century Chinese ceramics and gold and silver vessels. Its discovery suggests that Tang China had substantial sea trade with the Middle East; scholars had previously thought that the trade routes were primarily over land, along the Silk Road.

The company that salvaged the Belitung wreck, Seabed Explorations, is run by a German engineer, Tilman Walterfang, former director of a German concrete company who saw economic opportunities in wreck hunting in Indonesia.

when fisherman first discovered the shipwreck in early August 1998, the Indonesian government, fearful of looting, ordered Seabed Explorations to begin an immediate round-the-clock recovery operation. It started within days. Although Mr. Walterfang eventually brought in a pair of archaeologists, including one, Michael Flecker, who wrote two journal articles about the ship, Mr. Walterfang conceded that, from an academic standpoint, “the overall situation would without doubt be described as ‘less than ideal.’ ”[...] Seabed Explorations sold the majority of the 63,000 artifacts recovered to a company owned by the Singapore government, for $32 million [...] Some artifacts have ended up on eBay and other online sites.

On April 5th a group of archaeologists and anthropologists from the National Academy of Sciences — including Robert McCormick Adams, a former leader of the Smithsonian — wrote a letter to G. Wayne Clough, the director of the Smithsonian, that proceeding with the proposed exhibition would "severely damage the stature and reputation" of the institution. This opinion has been shared in recent weeks by the Society for American Archaeology, the Council of American Maritime Museums and the International Committee for Underwater Cultural Heritage, as well as groups within the Smithsonian, including the members of the anthropology department and the Senate of Scientists at its National Museum of Natural History.

The salvage firm's director Walterfang was dismissive of the exhibition’s critics, suggesting that the exhibition was being used as a “Ping-Pong ball in yet another political game for the social climbers in Washington, D.C.”. Archaeologist Flecker is reported as having argued that the "purist approach of many archaeologists" is simply

not practical in developing countries like Indonesia, where governments are poor and the risk of looting is high. In those circumstances, he wrote, archaeologists and commercial salvagers should cooperate “to document those sites and the artifacts recovered from them before too much information is lost.”

So a bit like an underwater Portable Antiquities Scheme then.

It will be interesting if the Smithsonian decide today not to host this ethically-questionable exhibition. If the haste and unmethodical manner in which they were excavated in our times is a criterion disqualifying Treasures from being exhibited in a proper museum, what are we to say of the hundreds of hoards and other finds hoiked out of the ground in Britain by metal-detector wielding treasure hunters? I wonder whether the Smithsonian will be seeking opinions form the British Museum and their Portable Antiquities Scheme and treasure Unit about their ethical dilemma?

Let's see if the Smithsonian allow a little thing like ethics to interfere with their exhibition plans.

An announcement on whether or not it will proceed with the show is expected in late May.

State Department Leak in the Black Swan Case

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Kimberly Alderman has an interesting post: 'State Department Leak in the Black Swan Case' (Dec. 16, 2010) revealing that:

WikiLeaks cables show that U.S. diplomats sought to broker a deal whereby U.S. embassy officials stationed in Spain would provide confidential customs documents prepared by Odyssey to the Spanish government. In exchange, Spain was to assist U.S. efforts to reclaim for U.S. citizen Claude Cassirer a Holocaust-era painting that was allegedly stolen by the Nazis during World War II.

Well this is interesting. The documents would have been prepared in the Gibraltar customs office - through which the so-called Black Swan treasure was exported, so how come they are in the hands of "U.S. embassy officials stationed in Spain"? The text of the full article on AmLaw: As Assange Indictment Looms, WikiLeaks Cables Tie Two Treasure Cases Together does not make this clear. These documents are quite interesting, as some of us would like to know how it is that Gibraltar officials gave permission for the export of a shipload of gold treasure that had as far as one can ascertain just arrived in the port out of the blue. Who was responsible for the decision at what level, and why? Should the items have not been retained until their origin and ownership was properly ascertained?

UPDATE: There has been an interesting article on this explaining the background more fully: Rossella Lorenzi 'Black Swan' Bounty Deal Revealed in Wikileaks Cables, Discovery News, Wed Dec 22, 2010

the leaked cables reveal that as early as 2007, the U.S. embassy handed over to Spanish authorities the customs import documents that Odyssey had filed when bringing the hoard of coins into the United States. "The information was confidential and to be used only for law enforcement purposes," embassy officials warned Spain's director of customs.

Odyssey officials are waiting for additional information “before taking any specific actions,” stated Greg Stemm, Odyssey's chief executive officer. “The possibility that someone in the U.S. government came up with this perfidious offer to sacrifice Odyssey, its thousands of shareholders, and the many jobs created by the company in exchange for the return of one painting to one individual is hard to believe,” the company said in a statement. "It is hard to believe that this really happened. It sounds like something out of a Hollywood script."

Facebook group criticises government stand over underwater loot seeking

While US collectors of portable antiquities of all kinds (ancient coin collectors, supporters of pot-digging robbers of ancient Native American graves etc. ) are trying to oppose their government's plans to protect the archaeological heritage, the British have another fight on their hands with theirs. The British government seems relatively unconcerned about the archaeological heritage as a whole. Quite apart from declaring the archaeological establishment to be a "partner" of metal detector usung artefact hunters and collectors, we have the Sussex fiasco. There is now a new Facebook group set up in order

to encourage the British Government to pledge that it will never again sign profit sharing deals with US-based Odyssey Marine Exploration and that it will always oppose mercenary profit-led salvage of historic marine archaeology sites'.

This seems a bit of a lost cause, as I bet they'll never pledge any such thing as they demonstrably like the "Treasures" so much more than preserving real archaeology, but please join to show your disapproval.

To become a member of the Group, you'll need to have a Facebook account,and then navigate to the group's page.

There is some interesting coverage of marine issues in the online version of the magazine "British Archaeology", mmostly based on the story of Odyssey Marine Exploitation's discovery of HMS "Victory" here (note the share prices graph), and a feature on undwerwater landscapes here.

Court says Odyssey must return Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes Treasure to Spain.

Apparently: "A United States judge has ruled that the treasure found by the Odyssey salvage team be returned to Spain. The decision is a judicial victory for the Spanish Government in a case which has gone on for more than two years, although the company has said it is to appeal. Judge Mark Pizzo, in the court in Tampa, Florida, considered that the cargo and treasure carried on the Spanish ship ‘Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes’, did not come under his jurisdiction, and therefore the items, with an estimated value of more than 500 million dollars, should be returned to Spain".
(h.b.'Tampa court says Odyssey should return treasure to Spain', Typically Spanish Jun 4, 2009)

More here, no doubt we will be hearing more soon, and especially as the appeal gets underway. Still, if this is true, it gives out the right message, and I expect the value of the stocks of the treasure hunting company are slumping, I'll not be buying any. Maybe US coin collectors might like to set up a fund to help the firm recover the costs of getting the artefacts out of this otherwise unthreatened archaeological site (and grave site) which they no longer will be able to sell.

Now it seems a good time to return to an unanswered question. How is it possible that seventeen tonnes of valuable artefacts belonging to Spain were flown from British-held Gibraltar to Florida in 2007? Why when landed in Gibraltar was this shipment not challenged by the British authorities?

Addendum 5/6/09: See now the Times Online article

Mexico says US treasure firm can't explore shipwreck

Mexico has denied the request of controversial U.S. wreck hunting and salvage company Odyssey Marine Exploration Inc. of Tampa, Florida, to explore and recover artifacts from a sunken 17th-century Spanish galleon in the Gulf of Mexico, the government said Monday. The galleon Our Lady of Juncal, was part of a fleet hit by a powerful storm in 1631 and sank with the loss of many hands.
A statement by Odyssey’s chairman Greg Stemm claims that "the proposal presented to Mexico for archaeological services [sic] is in compliance with the UNESCO Convention and would keep all cultural artifacts together in a collection." The proposal was turned down by Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History, because it "is not intended to conduct research and does not have the approval of archaeologists or an academic institution of recognized prestige". Odyssey does however seem to have won the British government over on the Sussex and looks likely to over the 1744 Victory wreck too. They do not seem worried by such issues. But good for the Mexicans.

Good Collectors Under the Sea

The 'political archaeology' blog The Assemblage has a tongue-in-cheek commentary on the exploits of Odyssey and its "let's-empty-the-site-onto-the-market-now" arguments for the Victory called a hint for the good collectors of the sea - which I could not resist drawing attention to.

With a compliant British government, Odyssey can expect none of the lawsuits or bad press caused by those pesky Spaniards. [...] Since Britain’s archaeological resource is officially up for grabs to whoever looks for it (as long as they’re not an archaeologist), perhaps Odyssey should establish an onshore operation.Using its massive budget to invest in cutting edge technology that can detect metal over many acres and far beneath the ploughsoil, it could set to work across the countryside, scanning every inch of the nation, revealing to us the wonders of the past, delighting in the hoards of context-less antiquities, and then selling them to us for a profit.

I am sure portable antiquity collectors would be only too happy.

Odyssey Marine Exploration Seizes on National Icon: How will Britain React?

"Tampa, FL – February 2, 2009 - Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc. (NasdaqCM: OMEX), pioneers in the field of deep-ocean shipwreck exploration, has discovered the long-sought shipwreck of HMS Victory lost in 1744, solving one of the greatest mysteries in naval history. ..."
and presumably looks to make a pretty packet from raising artefacts from her and selling them since that is what they are in the business for. The trouble is that these are the remains of a warship of the British navy and went down with all hands, so its a grave.

No problem. The British like letting treasure hunters do their thing on archaeological sites on land and under water, so it is no surprise to learn that "terms of collaboration between Odyssey and the UK MOD on the project are currently being negotiated, and an agreement similar to the Sussex Partnering agreement has been proposed". That's all we need.

There is an interesting report about the site that was initially code-named "Legend" here and (unlike the Black Swan affair at the time of discovery), we learn the names of the archaeologists involved: Neil Cunningham Dobson, Dr. Sean Kingsley, the former is acceredited as employed by Odyssey. They give all the reasons why they think the site should be explored and not preserved.

The preliminary "pre-disturbance" work on the wreck will figure on a Discovery Channel “Treasure Quest” episode, airing in the United States on Thursday, February 5 at 10PM ET/PT and in the UK on Sunday, February 8 at 9:00 PM.

Illustration, The Victory (from Treasure Quest).

Underwater convention - thanks Barbados

On January 2nd after Barbados deposited its instrument of acceptance as the 20th member three months ago, the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage entered into force.

The Convention aiming to ensure more effective safeguarding of submerged shipwrecks and underwater ruins was adopted in 2001 by UNESCO’s General Conference as a reaction to the looting and destruction of underwater cultural heritage.

The convention is based on four main principles: a) the obligation to preserve underwater cultural heritage, b) in situ preservation, i.e. under water, as a preferred option, c) no commercial exploitation of this heritage and d) cooperation among States to protect this precious legacy, to promote training in underwater archeology, and to raise public awareness of the importance of sunken cultural property.

Countries party to the Convention (in chronological order of acceptance/ratification: Panama, Bulgaria, Croatia, Spain, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Nigeria, Lithuania, Mexico, Paraguay, Portugal, Lebanon, Saint Lucia, Romania, Cambodia, Ecuador, Ukraine, Cuba, Montenegro, Slovenia, Barbados.
United Kingdom - no,
United States - no. Why not?

photo: Wreck of the Umbria - photo UNESCO

Heritage Heroes

A few years ago the Heritage Lottery Fund ran a "heritage heroes" award to celebrate the important and vital role volunteers play in delivering successful heritage projects which have brought about huge benefits for the heritage of the UK. The 2005 and 2006 awards are reported rather modestly.

On 17th January 2007, at the launch of the 2004 Treasure Report, David Lammy (Labour MP for Tottenham and Minister for Culture under Tessa Jowell at the Department of Culture, Media and Sport) as part of that government’s emphasis on “social inclusion” called British metal detector using artefact hunters and collectors ‘the unsung heroes of the UK's heritage’. Unlike the first set of awards, this was relatively widely reported by the media. Writing in the Guardian the next day, Maev Kennedy ('Unsung heroes of heritage' extolled for unearthing hoard of treasure) predicted that ‘the phrase will cause a sharp intake of breath among some archaeologists who still regard [detectorists] as little better than legalised looters’. She was wrong. It passed with relatively little comment in the archaeological world in Britain, most of whom are resigned to friendly collaboration with all and any artefact collectors and hunters since they apparently have little intention of facing conflict by trying to curb their activities. Most of them, like the Council for British Archaeology have adopted a conciliatory approach to metal detector using artefact hunters and collectors, preferring to praise “responsible detectorists” rather than point an accusing finger at bad practice or examining too closely the archaeological implications of its wider context with the antiquities collecting and the global antiquities market. Thus it was that the CBA took issue only on the point that not ALL collectors are “heritage heroes” – why? Because not all of them show the archaeologists what they’ve taken. [Also of course Mr Lammy was forgetting Scotland which has separate legislation and is not covered by the Treasure report he was discussing].

Even the more ‘serious’ papers are encouraged by such remarks to carry articles with titles such as “Buried treasure is yours for the taking” (Mark Bridge in the Times March 24, 2007) and Archaeological finds 'up by 45%' (BBC News 17th Jan 2007). So much for British “investigative journalism” and giving the reading public a rounded picture on which to form judgements.

Steve Weinman, in an editorial in the ‘Diver’ magazine in April 2007 however sees this in a wider context. Remarking on Lammy’s “interesting choice of words” he points out

Certainly there is no hint in them that the people who dig up artefacts long buried in the soil would be better advised to leave them where they are for others to enjoy finding at a later date. That's what divers are so often told. When did you last hear a diver described as "heroic" for recovering the bell from a long-lost wreck? He or she may have had to carry out a great deal of research and overcome many obstacles to secure the find. How difficult is it to wave a metal detector? [… This] seems to be a case of double standards in perception, between the heroic coin-shooters rummaging about on land and villainous divers rummaging about at sea.

My thoughts exactly Mr Weinman. It seems to me that this comment by David Lammy reflects some extremely woolly thinking by British archaeologists and policy-makers.

At the end of June 2007 David Lammy ceased to be Culture Minister (becoming the Minister for Skills in the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills) and by December the same year was using the word “unsung heroes” in another context.

Britain should ratify Underwater Cultural heritage Convention

There are only 17 nations who so far have ratified the UNESCO convention on the protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage (2001) and its Annex.

In order for it to enter into force, twenty states parties need to ratify it.

The British take pride in the fact that for a large part of recent history Britain was one of the prime sea powers, both naval as well as in terms of commerce. There is a fair bit of British cultural heritage scattered across the bottom of the world's seas.

Despite this, Britain is one of those nations that is still resisting ratifying this document. If we are intend to protect our global cultural heritage it is essential that all nations respect the spirit of the Convention, enforce abidance by the rules of the Annex to the Convention and establish administrative and funding mechanisms to allow the effective implementation of the Convention as soon as possible.

Of course that would get in the way of escapades like the British government’s hypocritical “HMS Sussex" deal with Florida based commercial treasure hunters Odyssey (yes, the same ones mixed up in the so-called “Black Swan” affair).