Trafficking in Antiquities—Controversies Defused

John Rowe, the CEO of Chicago-based Exelon Corp., almost found himself the target of an international controversy.^[1] At issue was a 2,600 year-old Egyptian sarcophagus that was kept in Mr. Rowe’s corporate office.^[2] This coffin, said to date from Egypt’s 26th Dynasty, was the subject of an angry letter sent to Chicago’s Field Museum from Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities Secretary-General Zahi Hawass, who said that the Council would never deal with the Field Museum again unless the museum removed Mr. Rowe as a named sponsor of the new King Tut exhibit.^[3]

The exhibit in question is called “Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pahroahs,” and more than one million visitors are expected to visit the exhibit over the next six months.^[4] At a pre-opening luncheon, Mr. Hawass admonished Mr. Rowe, who was not present, by saying that the sarcophagus “doesn’t belong to a person. It belongs to the whole world,” and “[n]o one has a right to have an artifact like that in their office or in their home.”^[5]

As we have noted a number of times before, foreign governments are steadily cracking down on individuals who collect and traffic in antiquities. This particular controversy seems to have been defused when Mr. Rowe agreed to lend the sarcophagus to the Field Museum indefinitely.^[6] When notified of Mr. Rowe’s decision, Mr. Hawass was mollified and said that Mr. Rowe “is a very nice man,” but there are hints that the dust has not settled completely.^[7] “I heard from some sources that Mr. Rowe has a big museum in his home,” said Mr. Hawass, “so I will wait until I have another fight with Mr. Rowe.”^[8] Mr. Hawass is also involved a dispute with the St. Louis Museum of Art, “which he said bought a 3,200-year-old mummy mask that was stolen from Egypt sometime after 1959—a charge the museum has said has no basis in fact.”^[9]

In other antiquities news, roughly a week ago, another institution is seeking to quell controversy surrounding its collections. The director of the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles has agreed “to recommend to the museum’s board to return ancient artifacts in its collections that Greece claims were illegally spirited out of the country.”^[10] The announcement did not specify which of the four contested antiquities—a gold wreath, a marble statue of a young woman, a votive relief, and a funerary slab—would be returned, but the matter is expected to be resolved in the next two or three months.^[11] In exchange, Greece has indicated that it “would be prepared to offer the U.S. museum long-term loans of Greek antiquities as part of the deal.”^[12]

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[1] F.N. D’Alessio, Egyptian Sarcophagus Controversy Ends Well, AP (via Washington Post), May 26, 2006.
[2] Id.
[3] Id.
[4] Id.
[5] William Mullen et al., King Tut Tiff Ends in Truce, Chicago Tribune, May 26, 2006.
[6] Id.
[7] Id.
[8] Id.
[9] Id.
[10] Nicholas Paphitis, Getty Chief to Recommend Partial Return of Antiquities to Greece, AP (via San Jose Mercury News), May 16, 2006.
[11] Id.
[12] Id.