Looking for the Anti-Antique Lefties

A few weeks ago I mentioned an article claiming to be “World Coin News” in which Richard Giedroyc a numismojournalist implicated me in something or other. I pointed out that the gentleman had not really grasped the gist of the China MOU which he was moaning about and suggested his readers might be better served if he checked out the facts before setting pen to paper.

Lo and behold, Mr Giedroyc has just come up with another one ( Cultural Patrimony Policy Still a Concern ), again sycophantically quoting the Executive Director of coin delers' lobby group ACCG. Giedroyc now demonstrates his belief that it is only "socialists" who are interested in conservation and people obeying the law. Astounding (he should meet my Mum, a true blue Thatcherite conservationist).

Where are these mythical Left wing archaeologists in the United States allegedly "against private ownership of any antique item regardless of how it was acquired"? Can Mr Giedrojc provide his readers a few references to statements such as this but made by these people themselves (and are not just words which numismoprovocateurs have put into their mouths)? Otherwise we'd be justified in concluding that this is at best alarmist overinterpretation and at worst simple myth-making to persuade collectors that they need the ACCG to "watch their backs' (sic) for them. Are the problems in getting new members so acute that the organization has to rely on misrepresentation and scare tactics to recruit them?

Who are these anti-antique-ownership "lefties" ? Name them and shame them ACCG !! Mr Giedrojć?

Stolen Iraqi artefacts still on the move

"Peru appears to be the farthest that purloined Iraqi treasures have traveled. Most other recovered items have come from neighboring countries. More than 2,500 artifacts have returned to Iraq from Jordan, along with more than 760 from Syria. Many stolen items have made it to further west. Thirteen pieces were found in Italy; and at least another dozen have surfaced in the United States, including a large statue of a Sumerian king".

(Mark Kukis Iraq's Ancient Treasures Lost and Found Time Feb. 19, 2009). He forgot the ones that are reported to have ended up in London in 2003. Arrests were apparently made, but I do not recall any mention of charges. I would have expected to see more reports of material being stopped by customs officials in the Gulf States.

It really is difficult to believe that only "a dozen" items wandered west across the Atlantic since 2003 and all twelve of them were stopped by US customs (the ones stopped at Lima airport were reported to have been found in the luggage of a US citizen going to the US). In 2008, the USA returned more than a thousand illegally exported items from Iraq that had been seized before the 2003 looting ("No criminal charges have been filed at this time in any of these investigations").

The "statue" referred to by Mark Kukis is presumably the Entemena one excavated in Ur. It is perhaps not entirely accurate to say it was recovered "in the United States", it seems to have got there through a "sting" operation in which one of the Aboutaam brothers seems to have played a positive role.

["Last year, federal prosecutors in New York contacted Hicham Aboutaam and expressed interest in trying to recover the statue, said one person with knowledge of those events. Mr. Aboutaam agreed to help. Subsequently, he or his brother made contact with an Iraqi expatriate businessman now living in Europe. Soon, that businessman, who was referred to as the broker, became the pivotal figure in securing the statue. Little is known about the businessman other than that he is involved in construction. But he began to shuttle among Iraq, Syria and other countries to make contact with those holding the statue and to negotiate its turnover. It was not known whether money had been paid to those holding the statue or whether promises had been made."]

Interestingly enough, though there was a lot of fanfare about the return of the object itself to the Iraqis in 2006, I do not recall seeing anything about the persons involved in its smuggling or offering for sale being apprehended or punished. This seems to be a general pattern, I get the impression from reading these accounts that the actions undertaken were "object-centred", rather than "preservation-centred", aimed at actually catching the smugglers and breaking the chain of the market in illicit antiquities.

See also: Barry Meir and James Glanz, 'U.S. Helps Recover Statue and Gives It Back to Iraqis' New York Times July 26th 2006.

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.

British "Nighthawks" on Facebook

Those US dealers and collectors of no-questions-asked antiquities (the usual suspects) and others who seem to have jumped to the defence of British artefact hunters might be interested to see some posts on Facebook from a small semi-literate group calling themselves "The Metal Detecting Nighthawks". The members include at least four people from London, one from Nottingham, one from Wales and a gentleman with a Scottish sounding name (log on for details). I'd like to think this was a very bad joke, I fear though it is not.

The topics discussed on this forum tend to be about “looting I did last night” with a excursus on the relative values of a “tumbler” (sic) and electrolytic stripping for cleaning the antiquities (for the uninitiated – neither should be used on archaeological metalwork). It is interesting to note that these persons mention the places they do their searching and it is clear that they drive some considerable distances to get to some of them, presumably specific sites.

These unrepentant individuals are jubilant that their hobby was recently in the news due to the recent publicity around the release of the Nighthawking report and have a few things to say about it. For example: “Me and Dan were once stopped by the police, they didnt give two shits that we didnt have permision and just let us carry on! I think they have slightly more important things to do.” (London) and from Nottingham “hey up dave , theres no mention about my area notts , must be theres nowt round ere lol thats wat they think lol [***] em eh” [misspelt expletive deleted]. One London resident admits “I hate farmers. Inbreds.” To which another Londoner replied [spelling and punctuation as in original]:

It just isn't right, Who says the land belongs to them, In my eyes no one as the right to own land, I have the right to roam and i will. I'm helping to preserve finds by getting them out of the ground, finds that would be lost via chemicals & pesticides that corrode metal, Also helping by keeping the finds away from Archy's who in my experience are crooks and keep the looty for themselves. Don't be worried about getting bust, Police arn't interested, tresspass is a civil matter, plough theft is an offence if you have finds on your person. As a final note i want to add a comparitive... someone who pays £10,* detects all day, doesn't fill is holes in and doesn't record his finds OR someone who nighthawks, respects the land, fills is holes in and records his finds. Which one is Dick Turpin? and who as the right morals?

I wonder where a Dick Turpin nighthawk would go to “record” his finds? To the PAS(?) or to a rival “recording” scheme? We may ask ourselves what function "recording" them would have... The Nighthawking Report (page 93, point 9.3.9) mentions the concerns about the use of the PAS to give tainted objects a false legitimacy. When I mentioned this on this blog, readers may recall Roger Bland threatened to have the law on me. I would say that since the Facebook gang give what seem to be their real names, he might do better looking elsewhere for someone to criticise. Have any of their finds turned up on the PAS database?

_
* I think this individual is talking about metal detecting rallies. It may be that these people from heavily urbanised areas see only two alternatives, either paying to go on a commercial artefact hunting rally or going on land without permission but for no payment. The option that it they could get free permission from a farmer as do many responsible artefact hunters seems not to have occurred to them. "Archy's" (sic) in this text presumably means archaeologists.

Photo: candid action photo or posed? From the Metal Detecting Nighthawks page of Facebook (author unknown)

PAS moves to allay fears over nighthawking

There was an extraordinary article published recently " Portable Antiquities Scheme moves to allay fears over nighthawking" by Richard Moss published on the 18th in "culture24" (which used to be MLA's '24 hours Museum'). In it Roger Bland head of the Portable Antiquities Scheme attempts to allay any fears the readers of the recent press coverage in the UK might have had about the scale of the problem of the various types of illegal artefact hunting in the United Kingdom.

It's not really a big problem he tries to convince us, along with "metal detectorist" and commercial artefact hunting rally organizer Norman Smith (here, with comment by US collector Jorg Lueke), former ACCG president Peter Tompa, ACCG officer, Californian coin dealer ('Classical coins') Dave Welsh and New York coin dealer ('Imperial coins') Alfredo de la Fe (see a pattern here?).

Over on Looting matters, Roger Bland attempts to defend his position as reported in the Culture 24 article. he admonishes David Gill:
Rather than just quoting headlines and opinions on this subject, it might be helpful to look at the facts that are published in the Nighthawking report. The problem here is that the report is pretty low on facts, it is based on a poor dataset and is rather incoherently-written. The label “nighthawking” is totally unsatisfactory and covers a number of different phenomena. Indeed, as Bland notes the report does indeed conclude (though on very uncertain evidence) that deliberate illegal artefact hunting on SMs is “down”, though I think not enough significance is attached to what it also says [Report p. 91] that one reason for this may be that all those likely to produce the material these people are after have already been denuded to such a state that further exploitation is uneconomical – this also means that of course that their archaeological and cultural value has been damaged severely. Likewise as Dr Bland himself points out the report explains why the raiding of archaeological excavations is less than it was in the mid 1990s [p. 91-2].

It seems rather disingenuous to claim that because the reports results suggested there two kinds of “nighthawking” were reduced that this is in some way a success of the PAS. The latter does not in any case not cover Scotland or Northern Ireland – in the latter the researchers found NO “nighthawking” (while in the former we do not have the 1995 figures). The counties identified however as most strongly affected are among those in which PAS outreach has been at a very high level of intensity and lasted longest.

Roger Bland further writes on Looting matters: But the facts in the Report do not bear out the assertion that came across in some of the media reporting that nighthawking is a growing problem. Well I suppose that really depends which “facts” one seizes on and which one ignores. I would say that the apparent non-reporting of treasure items in Scotland is not a problem on the decline, indeed we need more investigation to establish its scale, though measures are now being put in place in Scotland to combat it.

The 1995 study did not gather statistics on illegal artefact hunting on non-scheduled sites (ie the vast majority of known archaeological sites in the UK). The 2009 study had great difficulty gathering information on it, so it is impossible to say for sure using the gathered data whether it is actually “up” or “down”. That however is not the most important point. The results of the COSMIC study quoted by the OA “Nighthawking” report [p 31-2] however do suggest that it is currently a very substantial problem indeed. The report even suggests [p. 91] that this type of site is now being increasingly targeted as the formerly more productive scheduled sites have become denuded of finds.

Roger Bland suggests we in PAS want to work with EH to take the recommendations forward, but one of them was convincing the police and the courts (and landowners and law makers) that the problem is a serious and important one. That actually was one of the main reasons for compiling the report in the first place. I fail to see how the PAS is helping matters by issuing public statements working against this policy like “the report shows it is less of a problem than it used to be […] and we’re keen to get that message across”. What “message” is there here and on whose behalf is the PAS “getting it across”? In whose interests is the PAS trying to persuade the British public that this is “less than a problem than it used to be” when looking at the whole of the UK there is no evidence that this is the case at all (and it is simply weasel wording to say “but in a lot of areas of the country it’s hardly known about”).

The whole crux of the matter is that all the above-mentioned apologists seem to be saying that it is wrong to point out the problems engendered by existing policies, we should be looking at the "benefits" (sic) brought by the current system. That however is no excuse for not gathering information on illegal activity and discussing what to do about it, or showing that there is a need to do anything about it. This is like suggesting that since most citizens are law-abiding, we do not need to investigate crime. That would only benefit the criminals.

How ironic also it is that the article is illustrated by a photo of the Newark torc which newspaper reports indicate had been found under somewhat questionable circumstances by a man reportedly searching an aircraft crash site with a metal detector. The law of the United Kingdom (Protection of Military Remains Act 1986) requires that an artefact hunter (such as a "metal detectorist") needs a permit to search such sites. Enquiries last year indicated that no such permit had been issued to the finder by the relevant authority before the discovery was made.

Wealthy Art Patrons and 'Villainous Thugs'

Adrian Humphreys ('Plundered artifacts returned, but problem continues', National Post, Feb 18, 2009) writes:

Five valuable cultural artifacts seized by border guards while being smuggled into Canada have been returned to two African governments, ending their mysterious life on the run while highlighting the illicit trade in cultural antiquities, a pursuit that bonds wealthy art patrons to villainous thugs.

The items in question were two terracotta figurines and "an undated but culturally significant wood carving", repatriated to Nigeria, and three inscribed bronze bracelets turned over to officials from Mali. Of course any provenance these objects may once have had was (like that of many others) lost when they passed no-questions-asked antiquities market which is a cover for the illicit trade in "tainted" antiquities.

Nigerian High Commissioner Iyorwuese Hagher praised Canada's vigilance and called on citizens to support efforts aimed at "exposing syndicates who are still engaging in theft and smuggling and illicit trade in valuable items that form part of Nigeria's national heritage. "Africa continues to wallow in poverty when their raw materials and even artifacts continue to be plundered by thieves that benefit from illegal trade in these materials in international markets," he said.

The newspaper reports that on average, there are more than three seizures of suspected illicit cultural items at Canada's borders every month, according to figures provided by the Canada Border Services Agency. In 2007, border agents reported 38 seizures. The Movable Cultural Property Directorate has investigated 240 potentially illegal imports of plundered antiquities and made 13 returns since 1978 to eight countries, including Egypt, Colombia, Peru and Syria. Nevertheless despite their vigilance a lot is probably still getting through, a lot more resources are needed to curb this problem.

The Canadian newspaper points out that the illicit trade is fuelled, in large measure, by patrons in western nations with an insatiable desire to posess "unique objets d'art". As the value of these items goes up as legitimate sources dry up, it becomes more profitable for those willing and able to supply them by illicit means.

The illicit art market, of which plundered cultural items is a subspecialty, is considered the world's fourth-largest criminal enterprise - after drugs, guns and money-laundering - generating about $4- to $6-billion a year, according to the United Nations.

It is interesting however to see that the Canadian media seem currently eager to inform public opinion about the background to this trade (see here too) which we may contrast with the misinformation campaigns being conducted by US dealers-in-no-questions-asked antiquities which tries to play down the contribution made to their market by illicitly-obtained artefacts. Obviously a line drawn on the map acrosss the North American continent is dividing something - but what?

Two New Blogs and a website

There are two new blogs which seem worth a visit, both of them by collectors of portable antiquities, but these are not the usual "private property/constitutional rights/hang the rest" tub thumping collecting-mantra megaphones that seem to be springing up all over the place and all saying much the same thing (usually about coins). These two are different.

The first is by David Knell, British collector of ancient lamps whom I have had occasion to mention here earlier (Collection with Attitude). His blog is simply called "Ancient Heritage" and begins with a post called
Minor antiquities: the importance of keeping records which makes some interesting points with which I am broadly in agreement. He ends it saying: "Collectors can, and must, show that instead of working against conservation, they are working with it". ( A point seemingly lost on one apparently transatlantic "Lingocreative" who commented on it at length - but adressing his remarks to me rather than David... ).

The second blog is by an American lady called Robyn who collects Egyptian antiquities, but ethically. Her blog "Pieces of the Past: Ethical Antiquities Collecting" is also getting underway, at the moment with three interesting posts, the first on "why we collect, and the problems it can bring", then a discussion of some of the arguments we have all seen offered against responsible collecting and then a mention of the recent Greek vet case. Worth keeping an eye on.

While on the subject, I suspect I have not mentioned another long-established website of interest with similar aims. British "metal detectorist" Corinne Mills has a website "Metal Detecting... What's it all about?" which is dedicated to responsible metal detecting and is worth a look. A lady with the courage of her convictions.