Egypt Then and Now » antiquities theft

Egypt arrests Turk with ancient Coptic relics

Ben Morales-Correa — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 11:57:21 +0000

Customs officials on Tuesday arrested a Turkish man at Cairo airport after they found ancient 27 Coptic Christian relics in his luggage, an airport official said. The 72-year-old traveler is suspected of trying to smuggle three Coptic bibles, two illustrated papyrus scrolls and fabrics dating back to the 6th century.

The man reportedly said he had bought the items for 150 Egyptian pounds (27 dollars) from the medieval Cairo bazaar of Khan al-Khalili. (Another news source reports that the man said he had bought the relics at Cairo’s Khan el-Khalili bazaar for 150 dollars = 113 euros).

People convicted of trying to smuggle artefacts out of Egypt face up to 15 years in jail.

Monsters and Critics

Hurriyet Daily News

Egypt seeking return of ancient coffin from U.S.

Ben Morales-Correa — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 16:36:08 +0000

Egyptian and U.S. authorities are in talks to repatriate a 3,000-year-old pharaonic-era wood coffin that was smuggled out of Egypt 125 years ago, recently bought by an American from a Spanish dealer and shipped to the United States.

The ornately decorated coffin belonged to Pharaoh Ames of the 21st Dynasty, which ruled from 1081 B.C. to 931 B.C., said Zahi Hawass, the secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities of Egypt.

U.S. customs officials in Miami, Florida impounded it on February 26 for lack of paperwork establishing legal ownership. The American buyer subsequently relinquished his claim to the coffin.

Reuters

This time is Egypt's turn to return stolen artifact

Ben Morales-Correa — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 23:24:31 +0000

Egypt’s antiquities chief unveiled Sunday a bronze statue of what he described as an ancient Mesopotamian goddess that had been looted from Iraq.

Zahi Hawass said an Egyptian man working in Jordan was caught at Nuweiba port trying to smuggle the statue into the country. The antiquities chief said he couldn’t tell exactly the age or historical background of the statue, but said its headpiece suggests it is a female fertility deity. Hawass said the smuggler now faces between three to five years in jail, but this could change to 25 years if a new law is approved in parliament next month.

“When the invasion of Iraq began in 2003, we wrote to the British and American governments asking them to protect Iraq’s heritage and museums,” said Hawass. “But that didn’t happen.” Hawass said that since then his office has been tracking stolen Iraqi artifacts and has recovered some 5,000 items.

Iraqi diplomat Ahmed told reporters that 24,000 stolen artifacts have been returned to Iraq as of July 2008.

Dispute over a precious ancient Egyptian burial gold mask

Ben Morales-Correa — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 22:32:13 +0000

A stunning funerary gold mask of an ancient Egyptian noblewoman from the court of Pharaoh Ramses II is at the center of a controversy between the Supreme Council of Antiquities and the St. Louis Museum of Art, who presently has the artifact in its collection. The dispute has even escalated to the personal, as Zahi Hawass is calling Brent Benjamin, director of the museum a “wanted man” in Egypt for the crime of antiquities theft.

The precious mask was discovered at Saqqara by Egyptian archaeologist Mohammed Zakaria Ghoneim in 1952. Despite having carefully documented the finding and keeping the 3,200-year-old relic in a warehouse at Saqqara for seven years, as records shown, the burial mask of Ka Nefer Nefer somehow left Egypt and resurfaced in 1968 when the St. Louis Art Museum acquired it for half a million dollars from Phoenix Ancient Art gallery in Geneva, Switzerland. The gallery is owned by Lebanese brothers Hicham and Ali Aboutaam, two of the world’s most powerful antiquities dealers.

In 2004, an Egyptian court sentenced Ali Aboutaam in absentia to 15 years in prison after he was accused of smuggling artifacts from Egypt to Switzerland. The charges against him were later dropped by the Egyptian court for lack of evidence.

Ghoneim died in 1959.

Associated Press

Two Egyptians rewarded for turning in antiquities

Ben Morales-Correa — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 12:08:55 +0000

Two Egyptian citizens were rewarded for turning in two pieces of antiquities they found while each was redecorating his house in the northern Menoufiya governorate.

“The Egyptian Ministry of Culture decided to give each citizen five thousand Egyptian pounds (970 US dollars),” said Zahi Hawass , Head of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA).

The two pieces belong to pharaoh Ahmose of the 26th dynasty. Both objects are made of pink granite and bear the name of the king in hieroglyphs. After asserting their authenticity, the SCA took them to start their restoration process.

Few years ago, Egypt’s SCA had announced that anyone who will turn in a piece of antiquities will be rewarded, in a move to reduce theft and smuggling of archeological findings.

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