As I was reading about the Valley of the Kings again, I wonder why that was actually legal.
The curse redresses it
Because grave robbing is financially motivated for the sake of the individual robbing the grave. They are out to enrich themselves, not others.
Museums obviously do have some financial incentive, but they aren’t just turning around and selling these relics to the highest bidder. They trade with other museums, they share artifacts, for the enrichment of humankind, rather than their own personal enrichment.
When looking at places like the British National Museum and when we look at many other Museums created at the height of Imperialism they were definetely signs of power over any scientific purpose.
It is the ultimate power move to get away with robbing artifacts from all over the world and putting them on display in your capital. And then having the audacity to claim to “take care of them” for your “underdeveloped” people wouldnt know how to handle your own culture.
Shrug dead is dead. Short or long it doesn’t affect anything. People are just sentimentalists.
As far as I am aware, only the living have a problem with the grave robbing.
I for sure dont want anyone to unbury me, steal my last personal effects to put on display and toss by remains in some cooler waiting further analysis.
Who wants to have personal effects in their grave anyway? When I’m dead, I want to become soil as quickly and cheaply as possible.
And i hope your choice gets respected as it is your choice. The same should apply to the people whose personal effects have been robbed from their graves.
Only the living have a problem with anything tho
Depends on your religion, I guess.
If you ask native Americans, it is. Source: listened to stories from one
in the U.S we have the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), passed in 1990, requires museums and federal agencies to return Native American human remains and cultural items to their tribes. It’s all about respecting Indigenous heritage by ensuring that these items are returned to their rightful communities.
passed in 1990
Yeah it’s all about respecting indigenous heritage, sure. Remind me again, in which year they dismantled the genocider statues at Rushmore?
If you had actually ASKED the Sioux of the Black Hills about this, you’d know they’ve told pretty much everyone “yeah we don’t like Mt Rushmore, we don’t like Crazy Horse’s relief carving either, but we think destroying them is more disrespectful than just leaving them to fall apart on their own.” Like, this isn’t an uncommon thought. It’s just more complex than “blow them up”.
In 2023, the US government returned the remains of some children who were sent to the boarding schools (it’s still ongoing). Aside from the bones of children, there were also animal bones. Why were there animal bones mixed in? Because the children’s remains were pulled from where the school’s rubbish was buried. Separating the bones after all this time would be difficult.
I can think of no better reflection of how the US government treats indigenous people wherever it encounters them. Indigenous Americans have probably received some of the worst treatment. As always, actions speak louder than words.
Yeah, but those greaves are a part of a still existing culture and religion/beliefs, I don’t think it’s the case with the ancient Egypt, Vikings graves etc
That shouldnt matter. It remains an arbitrary decision by the living, who have no way of calling in the opinion of the deceased.
When coming across a burial site while doing archeological digging just restore it and move on.
The dignity of a human doesnt go away because people think his culture doesnt exist anymore.
It still is, but as always, sometimes we pretend it isn’t or just tolerate or accept it. Same goes for plenty other activities.
“You can’t rob the dead, it’s called archeology” - Trazyn the Infinite
And it’s always just about who have the power and who won. British Empire ruled over Egypt so Brits could steal whatever they wanted and they were never properly dismantled so they didn’t given almost anything back. Other examples include emperor Constantine looting most of empire to build and decorate city he modestly called after himself, but again byzaboo brain disorder is so common people are still defending this. Nazi Germany also robbed entire Europe but they lost hard so it’s properly called “robbing” nowadays.
You’re not the only one asking this. Lots of museums are putting in place policies against exhibiting human remains and working on repatriating remains they do have.
Things to websearch if interested, UK Human Tissue Act of 2004, and keywords along the lines of “museum policies human remains”.
Technically taking human remains isn’t grave robbing, it’s body snatching. Grave robbing is taking artifacts like jewellery.
So when Lord Carnarvon sent Howard Carter into the Valley of the Kings with his team…
…that was the Invasion of the Body Snatchers?
Thank you, that helps me a lot. :-)
It goes to hope far you consider consent. The tombs of the people that you are investigating probably wouldn’t have consented to it, but the people and their families have long since disappeared, with even the culture attached to it evolving to the point of non recognition, therefore it’s okay.
It is, they don’t care.
Might makes right, at least in many cases. Lots of stolen artifacts, and bones, stored away from the public, or the descendants
There is the legal concept of Mens Rea which has to do with the mental state of the person committing the act. And I think that applies in this case. Archeology has generally been about learning and providing knowledge of previous cultures. While the methods, mindset and actions of 18th and early 19th century treasure hunters left a lot to be desired, some of them did make some reasonable attempt at documenting their finds and preserving the context to provide that knowledge. Modern archeologists go to painstaking lengths to properly document finds and preserve as much knowledge as possible from finds. Grave robbers do none of this. Their motivations generally revolve around personal gain and they will destroy any context and knowledge in their attempt to make money.
Consider your own reading on the Valley of the Kings. Where did all of the information we have on the Pharaohs in those tombs come from? It’s from the work of the archeologists documenting everything found in those tombs. While there is certainly an argument for leaving things in the same state they were found in, that also means that the artifacts will continue to deteriorate and any further knowledge which might be gleaned from them will be lost. Sending artifacts to a museum isn’t all about putting them in cases for people to gawk at. It also means that actions are taken to preserve those artifacts and maintain them for observation and study in the future. Sometimes this does cause damage. Again, 18th and early 19th century preservation was often just as, if not more damaging than leaving those artifacts in-sutu. But again, the intention was to preserve, not enrich.
So, that’s how I would draw the line, based on the reason and methods used for the removal of grave goods. Is it done with the intention for the furtherance of knoweldge of previous cultures? Or, is it just done to enrich someone? And is the work being done using the current understanding and methods to best capture and preserve that knowledge for future generations?
you’ve enriched me today, great answer
It’s only archaeology when it’s then taken to the British museum. Otherwise it’s just sparkling grave robbery.
If it’s a grave of someone in living memory, then sure, it’s grave robbing, but even if someone knows it’s their 224x great grandparent then if there’s no memory either directly or even via oral history then it’s definitely archaeology
There’s a very blury line somewhere between the two, but it’s up to whoever shouts loudest or digs quietest to define that
Anyone who doesn’t like what someone does can call it robbery. Like charging a price that is too high in someone’s opinion.
But robbery in a legal sense is about property. If you dig up body in a legal cemetary, which generally means owned by some organization that runs the cemetery, that is probably real persecutable grave robbery. Elsewhere, not so much.
Because English archaeologists would have been upset by semantics.
