January 3, 2001
CONTENTS:
- SNAKE GODDESSES, FAKE GODDESSES
(How forgers on Crete met the demand for Minoan antiquities)
- Scientists: Army Corps Violated Site
- Museum Provenance List
- Czech Database of Works of Art from the Property of Victims of the Holocaust
SNAKE GODDESSES, FAKE GODDESSES (How forgers on Crete met the demand for Minoan antiquities)
BY KENNETH D.S. LAPATIN
In late May 1903, toward the end of his fourth campaign at the palace of Knossos, Arthur Evans and his crew raised some of the gypsum slabs at a spot they had overlooked when they excavated two years before, revealing two large rectangular stone-lined cists. Inside, they found scraps of gold; fragments of worked ivory and rock crystal; bronze and stone implements; numerous bones and shells; clay impressions of seal stones; and fragments of faience inlays, plaques, and statuettes. Believing the objects had been transferred from a damaged shrine and deliberately buried in antiquity, Evans referred to the cists as the "Temple Repositories."
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Evans' work at Knossos captured the imagination of the public. He appeared to have found the truth behind early legends of Minos and the Minotaur, Theseus and Ariadne, Daidalos and Ikaros. He also constructed the civilization of the Minoans, as he called them, as a rival to the ancient Oriental societies of Egypt and Mesopotamia, a precursor to the Golden Age of Greece, and the earliest high culture of Europe. Minoan art quickly became desirable, and the demands of museum officials and private collectors eager to possess artifacts associated with this newly discovered civilization fostered the activities not only of illicit excavators and smugglers, but also forgers, who were soon producing "Minoan" stone carvings, bronzes, ivories, seal stones, and goldwork to satisfy this market. At least 14 unprovenienced "Minoan" goddesses made their way into museums and private collections, and many were subsequently extolled as masterpieces of ancient art. Technical, stylistic, and iconographic evidence, including comparisons with unequivocally genuine excavated material, however, indicates that all of these figurines are modern.
More: http://www.archaeology.org/
Scientists: Army Corps Violated Site
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Eight scientists who are suing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, claimed Tuesday that the corps violated the National Historic Preservation Act by plowing over a burial site where a 9,300-year-old skeleton was found. The remains, known as ``Kennewick Man,'' were discovered in the shallows of the Columbia River in 1996 in Kennewick, Wash. The corps argued they were simply trying to keep looters away from the site when they covered it with 500 tons of rocks and soil in 1998. But scientists claim that the corps violated laws governing preservation of historical artifacts and risked ruining the original burial site. ``If Kennewick Man was buried in a grave with other types of artifacts, the chance of finding that out now - it's just flat-out impossible,'' the anthropologists' lawyer Paula Barran said. Corps spokesman Dutch Meier would not discuss the litigation. But, he said, ``It is important to remember that the corps' site protection work plan was very carefully planned and (then) considered by the Washington state Historical Preservation Office and the U.S. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation.'' The scientists, including two from the Smithsonian Institution, have asked the U.S. District court to prohibit the corps from reburying other ancient sites. Their lawsuit, filed in 1997, also contests a corps' decision to turn the bones over to five tribes who have claimed Kennewick Man as their ancestor. The tribes say a scientific study would violate their religious traditions. The anthropologists believe further study could reveal clues about the identity of the first humans on the continent, including theories that the continent's earliest arrivals came not by a land bridge between Russia and Alaska - a long- held theory - but by boat or some other route. Kennewick Man is being kept at a Seattle museum pending the outcome of the lawsuit. Oral arguments are scheduled for June 19. - On the Net: Kennewick Man Virtual Interpretive Center: http://www.kennewick-man.com/
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/
From: Jonathan Sazonoff Subject: Museum Provenance List
Dear Subscribers,
MSN has been covering WWII / Holocaust art repatriation issues for several years now. For those interested in this subject, a new and valuable resource is the Museum Provenance List. http://www.provenancelist.com
The Museum Provenance List is a compilation of museums that have listed works of art in their collections which contain questions and gaps in their provenance between 1933 - 1945. This web- site attempts to list the artworks in one place in so that claimants do not have to search through several different web-sites to try to recover lost art.
For any questions, comments, or if you would like to add your museum's provenance list to this site, please contact info@provenancelist.com.
Happy New Year to all!
Jonathan Sazonoff
Saz Productions, Inc.
http://www.saztv.com
Contributing US Ed.
Museum Security Network
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Czech Database of Works of Art from the Property of Victims of the Holocaust
http://www.restitution-art.cz, displays works of art from public collections in the Czech Republic that come, or may come, from the property of the victims of the holocaust; their original owners mostly perished under the Nazi terror. The Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic in cooperation with the Moravian Museum has prepared this utility. The work, carried out by the Ministry of Culture, is a part of the research, initiated by the Joint Working Group of the Government of the Czech Republic, pertaining to certain property injustices caused to the victims of holocaust and dealing with Jewish property, Aryanised during the time of holocaust, not returned to their owners after the War, and stolen again by the communist regime. The present list should serve mainly the original owners or, if they are not living any more, to their surviving spouses and offspring, to identify places where they can make a request for the transfer of ownership for the works of art. The list is not, and cannot be, complete; the Ministry of Culture will carry out its further updating in the course of year 2001. Besides state collections, works of art of that origin are also in the collections of the Jewish Museum in Prague. Information on these is available at the website of the Jewish Museum in Prague: http://www.jewishmuseum.cz