> A unique example of a Māori cloak or kahu kākāpō (‘cloak of kākāpō feathers’) has been preserved for future generations to enjoy after vital conservation work was conducted in a partnership between Culture Perth and Kinross, the British Museum and the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa
Maybe the article is wrong, or did you just not see the preamble?
That quote doesn't contradict what mkl said, towards the end of the article it does say this thou, "The cloak will be on display in the new museum developed in Perth, set to open in Spring 2024."
As your quote says, the conservation work was a collaboration. The cloak itself has since 1842 been in the possession of organisations in Perth, Scotland, the most recent of which asked the British Museum and Te Papa to help restore it, and it will now be loaned to the British Museum. It has not been in New Zealand in nearly 200 years, so has not ever been in our national museum, Te Papa.
Most of the British people who looted the planet are dead by now. As a result of tending to their ill-gotten gains, their descendants learned something about preserving priceless cultural artifacts. While it would be preferable that the looting had never occurred in the first place, hard to hate on the current museum keepers.
I often feel uncomfortable walking around the British Museum, seeing important artefacts from other countries.
That said, I’ll try playing devil’s advocate.
1. Some items are from areas now controlled by very different people to those for whom the item was originally important. Do modern descendants of the Spanish have any moral claim to Aztec or Inca artefacts, for example?
2. Some items have complex histories, where multiple competing countries could all claim it as part of their history. Where the item was found is not the end of the story. Items from Greece, Turkey, Cyprus for example.
3. By storing them in the British Museum, they are better maintained for future generations. Globally, more people have access to them right now.
Perhaps for those where the answer to all three of these is obvious, it’s indefensible that the British Museum still has the items. But there is quite a lot of stuff there where it’s not so obvious when you look into the details, though we should be putting a lot of effort into trying anyway.
1. Most Mexicans or Peruvians have indigenous ancestry, they are not exclusively (or even mostly) descendants of the Spanish. It would be better to return those artifacts to the descendants of those from whom it was stolen.
2. Who has an even weaker claim than all other claimants? The British Museum.
3. 2.5M people see the Crown Jewels in a year. The Smithsonian National Museum of American History in DC sees 4.1M visitors in a year. Should the Crown Jewels be moved to the Smithsonian? Surely we could take better care of them (they could go next to Dorothy's slippers) and more people would get to see them.
>2. Who has an even weaker claim than all other claimants? The British Museum.
One of the laziest dismissals I've ever read on this forum. Yep, the world is this zero sum game where they should just dump it on whoever and then let all the competing entities argue amongst themselves
Imagine that someone has died, and there are three inheritors squabbling for the various elements of the state. They can’t agree who gets the home, who gets the car, who gets the jewlry, etc.
There is also a fourth individual, a thief, who has broken in and stolen various family heirlooms of both sentimental and monetary value.
The thief claims then that, because the inheritors are squabbling, the only fair thing to do is that he should hold on to the heirlooms, at least until they sort it out (or so he says).
The response is short because the situation is simple. The British Museum contains the stolen heritage of people all over the world. Confusion or disagreement over the most rightful heirs is no defense of this crime.
>> 1. Some items are from areas now controlled by very different people to those for whom the item was originally important. Do modern descendants of the Spanish have any moral claim to Aztec or Inca artefacts, for example?
> 1. Most Mexicans or Peruvians have indigenous ancestry, they are not exclusively (or even mostly) descendants of the Spanish. It would be better to return those artifacts to the descendants of those from whom it was stolen.
This is an "easy to say, near-impossible to do" task that's been shoved with little effort from the proposer onto the museum staff. Short of comprehensive DNA analysis, finding the proper descendants for a particular artifact is not trivial. The response given does not take into account multiple competing claims towards the artifact, nor the possibility of all descendants that could properly claim it being dead, whether natural or not.
>> 2. Some items have complex histories, where multiple competing countries could all claim it as part of their history. Where the item was found is not the end of the story. Items from Greece, Turkey, Cyprus for example.
> 2. Who has an even weaker claim than all other claimants? The British Museum.
Calling misdirection on this response: It does not properly address the original question posed.
In an attempt to give a proper solution: Items with histories from multiple countries will have to put it into a round-robin-style sharing agreement, where the item/artifact will pass through the countries one by one before circling back.
> This is an "easy to say, near-impossible to do" task that's been shoved with little effort from the proposer onto the museum staff.
In principle, this is true, but in many cases the responsible party is very well-known and yet there is active resistance from the British Museum to repatriate the plundered items. For example, the Parthenon Marbles.
According to Wikipedia, the Parthenon marbles in Britain has been repeatedly asked (by the Greek government, then by UNESCO itself) to be returned to its original Athens, Greece location. They were literally taken out of Greece by an Earl of England claiming (with no paperwork!) authority from the empire occupying Greece at the time.
There is a literal museum in Greece containing every part that wasn't stolen this way, in their exact original placement, waiting for the stolen pieces to be returned to complete it. And the British are still resistant.
For example the Koh-i-Noor diamond passed through many hands, often through conquest. And perhaps the ruler who originally owned it didn't obtain it through entirely fair means.
1. This makes the task seem hard when in fact it is easy. If you have looted artifacts from the territory of Mexico, return them to the government of Mexico. While this is an imperfect solution, it is better than keeping the looted priceless cultural patrimony.
2. It’s not misdirection it’s a prioritization of claims. The British Museum’s claim is weaker than all regional inheritors. Therefore, picking one is a better solution than the British Museum keeping it.
> The British Museum’s claim is weaker than all regional inheritors.
Why? If one of the regional inheritors only possessed it in the first place because it stole it from somebody else (albeit a long time ago), what makes their claim more valid?
One of my ancestors helped bring the Parthenon marbles to the UK.
Another helped return works that were looted by Napoleon during his campaigns (my grandmother had one of Canova’s Ideal Heads which the ancestor received as a gift from Canova for returning those artworks).
This stuff is pretty complicated, simply returning it is not possible, for example with ISIS purposefully destroying historical artefacts.
Having artefacts in foreign countries is, in my opinion, a net good. It exposes folks to cultures that they would not otherwise get to see.
Should the UK give the US the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom in perpetuity so that more people get to see them? There are more people living in America and our cultural destinations have more visitors from all over the world.
Or is it only a net good when the UK keeps the priceless cultural heritage of other nations?
The point is: if you were from a culture that was looted, rather than the one which did the looting, would you feel the same as you do now? That it was a net good that the looting had happened so that others might enjoy your priceless heritage as a trophy of conquest?
It sounds easy, but the British Museum Act 1963 was brought in specifically to make it illegal to do - presumably because the original owners of the artefacts started to make an international fuss about the theft of their stuff.
Sure, but there's no indication that this will become one of them. If the Museum decides to steal it, definitely feel free to come back and say "I told you so!". But I think that is incredibly unlikely in this case.
