Museumsnytt

Facsimile of the article in Museumsnytt ©, no 5/6 2003, pp. 4-5

From Iraq contrary to the UN prohibition?

Text: Leif Anker

Has the collector Martin Schøyen objects that were exported from Iraq contrary to the UN boycott and Iraq's cultural heritage legislation? Schøyen's manuscript collection contains a number of manuscripts from Iraq, amongst others clay tablets from a couple of thousand years BC. Part of the collection is published via the Norwegian National Library's internet site. For several of the objects information on the previous owners is missing.

The question is whether they were exported from Iraq in the 1990's contrary to the UN boycott and Iraqi law. A number of Iraqi objects in Schøyen's possession have very uncertain origin. The UN boycott of Iraq was implemented in August 1990 after the attack on Kuwait and was tightened up for cultural objects as recently as may this year. Breach of the boycott after August 1990 can be covered by Norwegian legislation, whilst a breach of Iraq's own export ban will not result in sanctions under Norwegian law because Norway has not yet ratified the UNESCO convention of 1970 on the illegal trade in cultural objects. Ratification is being prepared by the Department of Culture for the spring, but will in any case not have retrospective force.

After the UN introduced a boycott of Iraq in 1990 illegal export, especially of small easily handled cylinder seals and clay tablets, is thought to have greatly increased as a result of, amongst other things, the situation in the country after the Kuwait war. Illegal excavation and export is considered by the leading international experts as a greater threat to the country's cultural heritage than the destruction that resulted from the military conflict this spring.

Martin Schøyen's large manuscript collection has repeatedly come under public scrutiny amongst other things because it includes objects that don't have clear or have disputed provenance (origin and ownership history). Part of Schøyen's manuscript collection was made available on the Norwegian National Library's internet site in the autumn of 2001. It is still there. According to the overview on the internet site the collection contains 9 catalogued objects from Iraq. The number is probably higher, at the time of writing 4864 objects were quoted as not catalogued or as having an unknown country of origin. Some of the objects in the Schøyen collection lack information, some do not have information on where and when they were bought whilst others lack a history of the previous owners. This is in contrast to most of the other catalogue numbers on the internet site that have detailed information on their previous owners. For a cylinder seal from Babylonia (800-600 BC) the only information that is presented is that it was bought at Christie's in London on the 7th of December 1994. This is more than four years after the UN decreed a general prohibition against trade with Iraq. Two other catalogue numbers lack any form of provenance at all.

In an e-mail to Museumsnytt, Martin Schøyen answered questions on the number of Iraqi objects in the collection thus:

- Generally I will say that I am strongly opposed to the destruction of archaeological monuments and illegal excavations where objects are removed from their contexts and a part of their history disappears. I follow a set of ethical guidelines when acquiring manuscripts, where one of the points is that there will be no purchase of manuscripts that I know were illegally excavated or exported, precisely to avoid suporting this kind of market.

- There is a limit to the details I can provide as I am currently abroad and won't be back in Norway before march.

- There are around 200 manuscripts that originate from Iraq (or Iran or Syria, it is not always clear which of these 3 lands is the place of origin) that are published on the internet pages. I don't have an overview of the total in the collection, that will have to wait until everything has been studied by the researchers.

- Some of the published objects have incomplete provenance e.g. MS1989, MS1815/1 and MS2199, whilst MS3020 and MS3021/1 for eample totally lack provenance. A clay tablet pictured in Museumsnytt number 2/2003 (p. 21) with the title MS2181/3 is not published in the internet catalogue. Could these objects have come from Iraq contrary to the country's own legislation or were they exported from Iraq after August 1990?

- You mention some specific manuscripts with incomplete provenance, for some of these I will have to investigate the documention, which is in Norway and at present out of my reach. One case, manuscript 1989 from a Christie's sale in 1994, I have already answered, earlier provenance is often not given by an auction house, unless the previous owner wishes it so. They can prefer anonymity for tax or other reasons, often familiar. As a collector one must asume that the biggest and most well known auction house in the world guarantees the legality of that which they sell. But it has, as is known, recently come out that for Sotheby's and Christie's this has not always been the case, but please don't blame me for their prospective sins. Two of the manuscripts were bought from B. Quaritch in London in 1994 and 1996. Quaritch are amongst England's most respected antiquarian book dealers and are suppliers to most of the national institutions such as the British Library and British Museum. I don't ask such suppliers whether what they sell is legal, it is a matter of course.

- It has come to the attention of Museumsnytt that there are objects in the Schøyen collection that were exported from Iraq after 1990, contrary to the country's legislation and contrary to the UN embargo. Is this a situation you can refute?

- As should be clear from the above, there are not, as far as I know, manuscripts in the collection that were exported illegally from Iraq after August 1990, but as also will be apparent, it is not possible to guarantee such things with 100% certainty, wrote Schøyen in his reply.

Security Council Resolution 1483 of May 2003 instructs all UN member states to co-operate in the returning of cultural objects and establish legislation that prohibits trade in such objects (see Museumsnytt 3/2003). For Norway this is regulated in the provision of 25.05.2003. There it states in § that "All trade in, or import or export of, Iraqi cultural objects that were, or with reasonable grounds can be assumed to to have been, illegally removed from Iraq after the 6th of August 1990 is prohibited. The prohibition covers all objects of archaeological, historical, cultural, scientific or religious significance. The prohibition in the first instance doesn't apply to the return of objects to the relevant Iraqi institutions".

Cultural heritage crimes come under the jurisdiction of Økokrim's (The Norwegian National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime) environmental team. Hans Tore Høviskeland, police lawyer in the environmental team underlined that he commented purely in general terms:

Export of cultural objects in conflict with the provision of the 25th of May of this year can be punished with a fine or imprisonment of up to three years. This means that a breach of the provision is punishable from the same point in time. Its is only a criminal offence if the provision is breached wilfully or through negligence, i.e. that one knew or should have been aware that they acted contrary to the provision, said Høviskeland. He is not aware of any cases in Norway of the illegal export of cultural objects in conflict with the UN's Iraq boycott.

Iraq has cultural heritage legislation, independent of the UN embargo, that is considered to be quite strict. Objects illegally exported from Iraq before the Iraq boycott are not covered by Norwegian legislation, because Norway has not ratified the UNESCO convention. The Department of Culture is planning to put a motion on Norwegian ratification of the UNESCO convention of 1970 on the illegal trade in cultural objects before the parliament during the spring session. A bill is now being considered by the appropriate bodies. A ratification would not have retrospective force.

Controversial collection

Egyptian authorities have previously called for the return of several objects from the Schøyen collection that they claim were illegally exported. Martin Schøyen, speaking to Dagens Næringsliv, rejected this demand on the grounds that they were bought legally.

In October Afghanistan called for the return of manuscripts in the Schøyen collection that were taken out of the country under uncertain circumstances in the 1990's (see Museumsnytt numbers 1 and 2 2002). Afghanistan's Minister of Culture Sayyed M. Raheen wrote in a letter to the Norwegian Ministry of Culture and Church Affairs (KKD) that the manuscripts are Afghani national property and that they were exported in conflict with the country's legislation. He asked that the Norwegian authorities take the initiative towards Schøyen with a view to returning the manuscripts. In a reply of the 29th of October the Minister of Culture Haugland expressed her support for the prevention of illegal trade in cultural property, but declined to actively intervene, as there is no legal grounds to do so under existing Norwegian law. The Minister of Culture was content to send a copy of the correspondence to Martin Schøyen. Parliamentary under-secretary Yngve Slettholm at the KKD said to Dagens Næringsliv that the Department would not contact Schøyen with a view to coming to an agreement. Schøyen has also rejected Afghanistan's demand and says that the manuscripts were acquired legally.

Captions:
Martin Schøyen, in conversation with former National Librarian Bendik Rugaas at a debate at the University Library on the Schøyen collection, march 2002. (Photo: Museumsnytt)

(Cases)

The Schøyen collection contains a series of catalogue numbers from Iraq, but Schøyen doesn't have a complete overview over the number or whether some of them can have been taken out of Iraq after the UN boycott. The cases contain a series of clay tablets with cuneiform script.

MS 3020/1
Cylinder seal "Jemdet nasr", Sumer, ca 31st century BC, h. 2,8 cm, diam. 2,0 cm. Provenance: Not given (Photo: Schøyensamlingen)

MS 3021/1
Cylinder seal, Babylonia with amongst others, fighting animals motif, Babylonia ca. 800-600 BC, h. 3,8 cm, diam. 1,3 cm. Registered provenance: Possible scriptorium Babylonia. (Photo: Schøyensamlingen)

MS 1989
Cylinder seal with a motif from the legend of Gilgamesh, Assyria 7th century BC, brown agate, h. 3,9 cm, diam. 1,6 cm. Registered provenance: 1. Christie's, London, 7.12.1994:222. (Photo: Schøyensamlingen)

MS 1815/1
Stone from the "Tower of Babel" with the inscription "Nebukadnesar, king of Babylon, guardian of Esagila and Ezidas temples, first born son of Nabopolassar, king of Babylon". Babylon 604-562 BC. Clay tile 33x33x9 cm. Registered provenance: 1. The Ziggurat in Babylon, "Tower of Babel", 2. Bernard Quaritch Ltd., London. (Photo: Schøyensamlingen)

MS 2199/2
Letter with a report to king Shulgi, Babylonia 1722 BC, clay, 10,5x7,1x2,7 cm. Provenance: 1. Bernard Quaritch Ltd., London (Photo: Schøyensamlingen)

MS 2181/3
Akkadian cuneiform script tablet from c. 2200 BC, not published in the internet catalogue. Provenance not given (Photo: Schøyensamlingen)

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