illicit antiquities trading in economic crisis, organised crime and political violence
German police have returned seven antiquities to Kosovo. Many of the details of the case are unknown, even to the German police, but others are being withheld. [I think I’ve identified the key unanswered questions in a follow-up post.]
I’ve begun redeveloping this blog. I’d like to say I’ve finished, but I fear it’ll take quite a while to establish very good systems for information-trapping and sharing/curation. The details are even less exciting than they sound, and the post is tl;dr, but I want people to be able to find out how I source my information and why I discuss the looting and destruction of homes and neighbourhoods in community conflicts as well as the looting and destruction of archaeological sites and historic monuments in wars…
First of all, I want to apologise to subscribers for the @samarkeolog tweet archive “spam”. I turned off every notification I could, precisely in order to save (Twitter) followers and (Facebook) community members from hearing about the (real but uninteresting) posts, but I couldn’t stop e-mails to subscribers.
Second, I’m in the process of redeveloping my blog, which I will explain in deeply dull detail in the following post. Briefly, I’m revising my blog (and @conflictantiq Twitter feed) to try to document looting and destruction of cultural property in crises and conflicts as-it-happens. I’d be grateful for any comments (about the subject, the presentation, the delivery…); I’m keen to make my material as useful as possible.
Happily, WordPress have unblocked (my access to) my blog.
As Dorothy King says of the Syrian situation, the ‘[l]oss of life [is] terrible, huge compared to looting going on’. Our primary concern must always be the human cost. Grotesquely, one of the reasons I don’t address the human cost here is that too many people are being maimed and killed too fast for me to keep track. All I can hope with any of my work on conflict antiquities is that it somehow, sometime, contributes to the re-establishment of peaceful community life.
David Meadows (@rogueclassicist), Dorothy King (@DorothyKing) and Paul Barford (@PortantIssues) have been discussing the illicit trade in antiquities amidst the Syrian civil war. Thankfully, Meadows and King debunked the Assad regime’s claims about the looting-and-smuggling of the Odyssey mosaics from Apamea. However, I fear that some of the scepticism towards allegations of rebel engagement in antiquities looting and smuggling ignores repeatedly, independently-confirmed information from non-partisan sources on the ground.
Partly to help me (publicly) archive material from before my @conflictantiq Twitter feed on looting and destruction of cultural and community property, partly to help me clarify (for myself) what I want to document on it, I’ve copied-and-pasted(-and-hyperlinked) the (immediately or otherwise) relevant material from my @samarkeolog Twitter feed (on professional, Balkan and Mediterranean matters).
It was a huge time sink; but I am utterly dedicated to uneconomic(al) activity.
@samarkeolog tweets on the illicit antiquities trade elsewhere (than Cyprus, Greece, Turkey and West Africa – Mali and Nigeria) are here.
Partly to help me (publicly) archive material from before my @conflictantiq Twitter feed on looting and destruction of cultural and community property, partly to help me clarify (for myself) what I want to document on it, I’ve copied-and-pasted(-and-hyperlinked) the (immediately or otherwise) relevant material from my @samarkeolog Twitter feed (primarily on professional, Balkan and Mediterranean matters).
It was a huge time sink; but I am utterly dedicated to uneconomic(al) activity.
@samarkeolog tweets on the illicit antiquities trade in West Africa – Mali and Nigeria – are here.
Partly to help me (publicly) archive material from before my @conflictantiq Twitter feed on looting and destruction of cultural and community property, partly to help me clarify (for myself) what I want to document on it, I’ve copied-and-pasted(-and-hyperlinked) the (immediately or otherwise) relevant material from my @samarkeolog Twitter feed (primarily on professional, Balkan and Mediterranean matters).
It was a huge time sink; but I am utterly dedicated to uneconomic(al) activity.
@samarkeolog tweets on the illicit antiquities trade in Turkey are here.
Partly to help me (publicly) archive material from before my @conflictantiq Twitter feed on looting and destruction of cultural and community property, partly to help me clarify (for myself) what I want to document on it, I’ve copied-and-pasted(-and-hyperlinked) the (immediately or otherwise) relevant material from my @samarkeolog Twitter feed (primarily on professional, Balkan and Mediterranean matters).
It was a huge time sink; but I am utterly dedicated to uneconomic(al) activity.
@samarkeolog tweets on the illicit antiquities trade in Greece are here.
Partly to help me (publicly) archive material from before my @conflictantiq Twitter feed on looting and destruction of cultural and community property, partly to help me clarify (for myself) what I want to document on it, I’ve copied-and-pasted(-and-hyperlinked) the (immediately or otherwise) relevant material from my @samarkeolog Twitter feed (primarily on professional, Balkan and Mediterranean matters).
It was a huge time sink; but I am utterly dedicated to uneconomic(al) activity.
@samarkeolog tweets on the illicit antiquities trade in Cyprus are here.
Partly to help me (publicly) archive material from before my @conflictantiq Twitter feed on looting and destruction of cultural and community property, partly to help me clarify (for myself) what I want to document on it, I’ve copied-and-pasted(-and-hyperlinked) the (immediately or otherwise) relevant material from my @samarkeolog Twitter feed (primarily on professional, Balkan and Mediterranean matters).
It was a huge time sink; but I am utterly dedicated to uneconomic(al) activity.
@samarkeolog tweets on organised crime are here.
conflict antiquities 