Oops! Looks like someone hasn't read the UNESCO 1970 convention. Manuscripts are in fact explicitly protected, as are *cough* incunabula.
Let's have a thread about provenance, UNESCO, and the priciest Qur'an ever sold: 2 days ago at Christie's for $8M.
portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_…
Let's have a thread about provenance, UNESCO, and the priciest Qur'an ever sold: 2 days ago at Christie's for $8M.
portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_…
OK enough shade ;-) In this thread I'm going to respond to the points raised by @incunabula one by one. I don't agree with their reading of the legal or ethical boundaries. But I do agree that having a public conversation about this is a good thing.
ICYMI @incunabula is responding to my thread about the incomplete provenance for this breathtaking 15th c. Timurid Qur'an on Ming colored and gold painted paper that just sold at Christie's for that unprecedented sum.
There are several problems I see with @incunabula's argument: one incorrect statement, two straw men and a red herring. In sum, they argued 1) UNESCO is non-legally binding/not enforceable and lotsa ppl just ignore it (nope) 2) Manuscripts/books aren't antiquities (red herring).
3) it’s Orientalist to focus on “saving” Asian/Islamic mss only (straw man) and 4) no one cries over the sale of Euro mss (they do)
Let me explain, and let me say again I'm grateful to @incunabula for raising these points, because I think they're frequently misunderstood.
Let me explain, and let me say again I'm grateful to @incunabula for raising these points, because I think they're frequently misunderstood.
But one other thing before I begin - yes, I'm an archaeologist, not a manuscript specialist. But I'm also a published expert on cultural heritage. I did my homework, and I know what I'm talking about. That doesn't mean the law isn't complicated. But I've got my head around it.
For this thread, I consulted with a half dozen manuscripts experts and three experts in cultural heritage law. Grateful to @Yael_Rice, @LadanAkbarnia, Christiane Gruber, Moya Carey, @Jake___Benson, @_nainsukh @PGerstenblith, @DrBrianIDaniels and @artcrimeprof. Collaboration FTW!
Let's go! Claim: UNESCO 1970 is non-legally binding and non-enforceable, Asian & MENA museums ignore it. This is a puzzling statement b/c it's largely inaccurate. In fact, UNESCO is legally binding the minute States Parties ratify and implement domestic legislation to enforce it.
Now where it gets tricky is that ratification dates and implementing legislation vary. So the US implemented UNESCO when it passed Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act (CPIA) in 1983, but UK didn't pass implementing legislation until 2003. law.upenn.edu/live/files/642…
So dates of ratification and implementation of UNESCO 1970 vary by country, but as of now, 193 of 195 global nations have ratified and/or accepted the Convention, including the vast majority of Middle East and Asian countries. whc.unesco.org/en/statesparti…
@incunabula cites the seizure of the Gilgamesh Tablet and presumably the ca. 3500 Iraqi artifacts forfeited by Hobby Lobby in 2017--that was done under several legal principles but one was the US implementation of the 1970 Convention.
In short, the statement that UNESCO 1970 is "non-legally binding, non-enforceable" doesn't hold up to scrutiny. What *is* true is that implementation laws and dates vary by country. Does it apply to manuscripts? Yes. As I noted, protection of manuscripts is right in Article 1.
In addition, mss are covered as ethnological objects in Article 9, which applies only to archaeological and ethnological objects. In the U.S., it's article 9 we use to enact Memoranda of Understanding/Bilateral Agreements that we now have with 20+ countries.
For example, Byzantine religious manuscripts are listed for countries such as Greece and Cyprus and Islamic manuscripts are listed for countries such as Yemen on the designated lists as ethnological objects. Mali & US have an MOU that protects manuscripts. eca.state.gov/highlight/unit…
The Egypt MOU covers Coptic manuscripts, a broad range of papyrus manuscripts, books and scrolls (including hieroglyphic, hieratic, Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Coptic and Arabic), and writing on papyrus, wood, stone, metal, textile, clay and ceramic.
These can't be imported if they left the country of origin illegally after the date on which the agreement went into effect.
So while the 1970 *Convention* is legally binding, it's true that date of implementation varies. But the 1970 date still matters. I'll come back to that.
So while the 1970 *Convention* is legally binding, it's true that date of implementation varies. But the 1970 date still matters. I'll come back to that.
This brings us to @incunabula's second argument: "manuscripts are not antiquities". This is a straw man. The point is not the semantics of this word "antiquities". Nor can we argue that a particular time-depth is the only criterion for heritage value.
Under US law manuscripts that are at least 100 years old are considered to be archaeological resources under the Archaeological Resources Protection Act. This was applied in prosecution of a dealer who traded in manuscripts stolen from European collections, including the Vatican.
The idea that manuscripts don't have particular find-spots, that they circulated & thus are "different" from archaeologically-excavated objects is also unconvincing. A manuscript can be in a library for centuries, and archaeological objects also circulate. pbs.org/newshour/show/…
I'm a ceramicist, and I can tell you ceramics moved around. A lot. As did objects in metal, wood, textiles. No one would argue the provenance of the Baptistère de Saint Louis doesn't matter because it "moved across regions and from country to country". khanacademy.org/humanities/ap-…
I know the claim about movement is made by collectors and manuscripts experts so often that it's a sort of article of faith, but frankly, it's not terribly convincing as an argument for why provenance doesn't matter. Manuscripts are simply not unique in this regard. Red herring.
Lastly, @incunabula's two intertwined arguments: that it's "Orientalism" to focus on Middle Eastern manuscripts, and that no one raises objections when Western manuscripts sell on the market.
So, this reading of Orientalism is a new one to me. Said's argument was that orientalist scholarship sought to know the M.E. in order to dominate and control it. It seems to me that arguing for rights of M.E. ppl to knowledge of their own cultural patrimony does the opposite.
If anything, it's the erasure of provenance and our acceptance of its absence that is Orientalist, because it perpetuates colonial models of heritage exploitation to serve the ends of western collectors, museums, and markets. So, "Orientalist"? No.
As for western manuscripts, I'm in complete agreement that we should fight just as hard for them as we do for those from the M.E. I guess I'd have to see some evidence that we don't. The case of the Vatican manuscripts noted above is just one example.
I could also point to the example of the Zeytun Gospels, an illuminated Armenian gospel book that landed at the center of battle over provenance when the Canon Tables were purchased by The Getty - see my review here of @HeghnarW's heartrending book here: caareviews.org/reviews/3604#.…
And there are, I'm sure, other examples. Given the large number of Islamic manuscripts that come onto the market and which pass unremarked through auction houses, I guess I'd have to see some firm evidence of disparate responses. I work on the M.E., so that's what I do!
But I want to come back briefly to the bigger point that I was trying to make in my thread. Because I think this is less a legal argument than an ethical one. I think 1970 is an imperfect date, but it's the one we've got. I think we need to build on it.
And I’m not alone – aside from the growing legal support, there’s a growing consensus in the U.S. and European museum world that a 1970 provenance consensus needs to be put in place. ICOM adopted the 1970 standard in 1986, between 2006-2008, the AAM and the AAMD adopted 1970 too.
To say that the date of 1970 is not fully legally implemented and so we’re under no obligation to comply is, I think, to tragically miss the point. Just because something is legal doesn’t mean it’s right.
And even if we can’t achieve full provenance transparency in every case, my feeling is we must begin to think of manuscripts and other cultural heritage as not only coveted objects on a global market, but as sustaining elements in a human rights and restorative justice framework.
Apologies for the Extremely Long Thread, but I felt this was worth expounding on. Very grateful once again to @incunabula for starting this conversation.
Correction: I accidentally linked to the 1972 World Heritage Convention ratification data instead of UNESCO 1970. Here’s the correct link - it should be 140 States Parties, not 193. Thanks for catching that, @PGerstenblith!
unesco.org/eri/la/convent…
unesco.org/eri/la/convent…
