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Course: Special topics in art history > Unit 1
Lesson 6: Destruction, looting, and trafficking- Mesa Verde and the preservation of Ancestral Puebloan heritage
- A market for looted antiquities
- Save culture—end trafficking
- Trafficking the past
- We will need Monuments Men for as long as ancient sites remain battlefields
- What the bulldozers left behind: reclaiming Sicán’s past
- Lost History: the terracotta sculpture of Djenné Djenno
- The Looting of Cambodian Antiquities
- The scourge of looting: trafficking antiquities, from temple to museum
- How a famous Greek bronze ended up in Rome
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The scourge of looting: trafficking antiquities, from temple to museum
Looting and trafficking of antiquities is a global problem, causing devastation to archaeological sites, especially during conflicts. This illicit trade, which funds insurgent and terrorist groups, threatens historical treasures in countries like Cambodia, Syria, Egypt, Libya, Mali, and Tunisia. Urgent action is necessary to halt this destructive activity. Archaeologist and legal expert Tess Davis (CAS'04) talks about the illicit antiquities trade, and how the looting of archaeological sites in conflict zones goes to fund paramilitary groups and terrorist organizations.
Want to join the conversation?
- The claim was made, and I don't doubt that it's verifiable, that antiquities are looted and trafficked during times of civil strife. What the video lacked was reference to a specific instance in the 21st century. Could Boston University or Ms. Davis provide a few for our benefit? What has been found? Where is it now? What has been done about the buyers purveyors and looters?(8 votes)
- what was the first museum?(1 vote)
Video transcript
My friends often accuse me of ruining visits to museums for them. They say
that I ruined their visits to museums because if you look closely at the antiquities
in museums, you often see things like chisel marks and hacksaw marks. Violent evidence of how those pieces got into a museum to
begin with. I came to Boston University specifically
to study archaeology, and started learning about the looting
of archaeological sites and trafficking of antiquities and what a huge global problem it is. I went to
Cambodia as an undergraduate and saw are just how
devastating this problem was on the ground.
Cambodia's temples, some of them are over a thousand years old. At some of the sites their word dozens
freestanding statues. For example, the temple of Koh Ker in the
Sotheby's case was described by an early explorer as a historical museum due to the abundant statuary there. When you go to Koh Ker today, there are no freestanding statues. There are just empty pedestals, there are
holes in the wall, there are fragments of pieces. These sites have been absolutely devastated, and that devastation was not something that took centuries.
The evidence we have shows that the looting happened almost exclusively during the Cambodian Civil War against
the Khmer Rouge. When conflict erupts in an archaeological rich country, suddenly
the art market is flooded with antiquities from those countries. And it's not just a historical problem
either. The illicit antiquities trade is threatening sites around the world, but
still going on now in Syria, and Egypt, and Libya, and Mali, and Tunisia, which is
why I think the public should know that this is not just a white collar crime,
that insurgent groups that terrorist groups are using the antiquities trade to fund
their efforts. I do fear that by the time we, we get our act together on this it's
going to be too late. Unless we stop the looting of archaeological
sites, there really will be nothing left.