A major focus of public international heritage law and concern is the looting of archaeological sites to satisfy the intense, worldwide demand for ‘antiquities’ for the illicit ‘antiquities market’. Looting destroys context and information, both critical to the conduct of scholarly archaeology and thus the preservation of heritage knowledge. Looting of archaeological sites has gone on for centuries, indeed millennia. Prior to 1940, few nations outside Europe had national legislation aimed at protecting movable cultural property (Egypt and Turkey were major exceptions). Thereafter the pace quickened as new nation states emerged from colonial situations, although the effectiveness varied by country, time, circumstance, and the demands of the illicit antiquities market and major museums.
After c. 1970, looting and trafficking in antiquities reached ‘crisis’ proportions as demand accelerated among wealthy individuals and unscrupulous museums, including several major art museums in Europe, the United States, and Asia. A major focus of national laws, international conventions through UNESCO and its related agencies, and various treaties between nation states has tried to slow or stop the trafficking, but with little success.
Prior to 1970, major museums were (and some still are) major end-purchasers of illegally obtained antiquities. After 1970, museum and museum association codes of ethics relating to looting began to be developed in Europe and the United States. Most codes focus on the refusal to purchase art objects or antiquities without appropriate provenance. The ‘International Council on Museums (ICOM) Code of Professional Ethics’ states that:
The illicit trade in objects destined for public and private collections encourages destruction of historic sites, local ethnic cultures, theft at both national and international levels... contravenes the spirit of national and international patrimony... So far as excavated material is concerned, ... [a] museum should not acquire by purchase objects in any case where the governing body or responsible officer has reasonable cause to believe that their recovery involved the recent unscientific or intentional destruction or damage of ancient monuments or archaeological sites, or involved a failure to disclose the finds to... the proper or legal government authorities. (International Council on Museums (ICOM) Code of Professional Ethics).
The McDonald Institute of Archaeology at Cambridge University in 1997 established an Illicit Antiquities Research Centre to coordinate actions and promote information dissemination on problems and potential solutions to looting and trafficking in antiquities. The problem, however, remains a serious one. The reader is referred to the various UNESCO instruments and those of related organizations for details on the linked attempts to stop or impede the trafficking across international boundaries. Overall, the instruments are minimally effective in the face of huge profits made by those involved in the trafficking.
World History
