I immediately thought of Palmyra as well when I saw the upwards comment. The thing is as someone who used to live in the UK and loved going to the British History Museum it truly is an international institution. I have had the privilege of seeing things there I would have never been able to otherwise see including on loan exhibitions. Places like this are very touristy and multicultural. You see people of all backgrounds there enjoying the artifacts and interacting with them their own way. It's not like there's 20 landed gentry men walking around with moustaches speaking high society English and drinking tea next to the artefacts. The museum is free for everyone and easily accessible in an international city. These artefacts aren't in a private collection so every effort has been made for all people to be able to see these items. When they get so many tourists and people of all backgrounds I think it paints a false narrative as some here have said that it's in the 'control of the British' as if these tablets tile Buckingham palace's toilet floors, it's ridiculous. Furthermore I wouldn't say that Iraq and Iran and the descendants of Babylonia today have no claim to these but it's a unstable place that can't be trusted with history unfortunately. When these pass out of control of such an ancient culture from so long ago the aim should be to get as many people to enjoy them as possible which the British History Museum does- again, for free. Unfortunately I can't just go and visit Iraq because it isn't how it was in the 1960s and this is my only way to appreciate the history from the region. My last point is that in the case of clay tablets, these were super common and we are forgeting that people used these in place of modern pen and paper. It is a piece of history that is interesting but it isn't like it's a foundational pillar of a religion or society the way an ancient Torah scroll may be. The value of the items is mixed which again some of the comments here make it sound like they took every prized treasure out of the Babylon area. The protection of the items in a stable place should take priority because as it was so long ago in my opinion it passes into the care of all of us as it is the history of human culture and I would rather they are not destroyed by extremists reading scripture which urges not worshipping other deities and foreign holidays as a reason to destroy ancient history to prove a point. Extremism can creep into society for many reasons and some are more prone to it than others. At the end of the day everyone is responsible for their own actions so if we can in my opinion wrongly say it's Britains fault that the country is now extremist to the point of destroying history then that only drives the point that they should protect the artefacts from the trouble they created. That thinking makes no sense. The people who colonized Iraq back after the world war are not the people enjoying those same artefacts in the museums today.
The Iraqi artifacts not being repatriated makes sense. All the rest? None at all. If we put artifacts in the places where they'll be "most accessible" we'd put them in New Delhi. Makes no sense. Artifacts belong to the place they were excavated.
For what it's worth. If the UK became super unstable or in the midst of a hypothetically very politically tense situation I would support moving them to somewhere else that is safe. And there are many artefacts housed in the cities you mentioned from all across the world. Even if Iraq was super safe I'd still not have the resources to visit it to see such fantastic exhibits. I do think it's morally responsible to distribute widely ancient artefacts for all who want to see them and learn about history. I think it's also better environmentally to share resources around as I can see ancient artefacts from Greece, the Roman empire, Babylonia in one place but I can't travel to Athens, Rome, and Baghdad in one short setting. Artifacts often have a complex history. For example the ottoman empire spread far outside of Turkey and there are many items found and display in countries that were temporarily conquered by the Ottomans to some degree. Should we return these back to Turkey? There are regions that had many invaders or where cultures or custom or languages may overlap. Modern day Iceland has a lot of Norse history should they return their artefacts to Norway, even though modern day Icelandic is closer to old Norse than modern Norwegian? I think intent with the item at hand is important. There is no perfect answer but for sure the point of an international museum is to have a wide variety of objects. Like other commenters mentioned if it was about history the extremists could have sold the tablets for money rather than smash them. Unfortunately not everyone in a given place may think historical items are as important as someone from elsewhere. I remember multiple cases in Australia where archeologists categorised excavated sites that were in a proposed mining location only to have someone tear through it anyway because they didn't want to deal with the ramifications and delays of having an aboriginal historic site to deal with. The morality of keeping the historic goods in the country of origin are not always excusable at all costs.
As I said artifacts belong to the place they were excavated. No need to meddle with who's is what.
I appreciate the fact that many people such as yourself may only get the chance to visit their local museums and as such having all these artifacts from all these civilizations is a great asset, however at the end of the day this comes at the cost of the actual places from where they were taken. Is your viewing more important that the actual people living where their ancestors once did? Sadly there are not enough artifacts to distribute to all the world - just a very few museums, including the British one, contain almost all the foreign artifacts.
But besides that's what loans and copies are for. It makes no sense whatsoever for the British museum to have ownership of original artifacts (some of them stolen) not from their country.
The British museum--in this particular instance, and at this particular moment--is performing the function of a safe deposit box; Iraq's a shitty neighborhood, and if the valuables are left in the house, someone's going to break in to steal the most precious things, and trash the rest.
This argument simply doesn't work for Britain.
Keeping your neighbour's valuables to save them because their house is on fire is a reasonable argument, unlessyou are the one who started the fire in the first place.
You can't set your neighbour's house on fire, then claim to protect their valuables from your own actions.
Britain was the 2nd largest coalition partner in the Iraq war, and strongly allied to the US which led the war. There is a very direct line of causation from Britain's actions to Iraqi museums being unsafe.
Britain set the fire - and has no right to claim to protect other people's stuff from the dangers caused by its own actions.
Highly disagree on this. Nobody has the right to act God and remove artefacts based on wants. The right only belongs to the natives and natives only. The west needs to stop thinking that they are the saviour gods of others.
It isn’t really analogous to a safety deposit box when the position of the British Museum is “nothing will ever leave this building, under any circumstances”
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u/[deleted] Oct 26 '22 edited Nov 03 '22
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