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Egypt asks Interpol to trace Tutankhamun relic auctioned in UK Egypt asks Interpol to trace Tutankhamun relic auctioned in UK
(about 5 hours later)
Egypt has asked Interpol to track down a 3,000-year-old Tutankhamun artefact sold in London for £4.7m despite fierce opposition from Cairo, government officials said. Egypt is planning to sue over the sale at Christie’s auction house in London of a 3,000-year-old Tutankhamun sculpture that may have been looted from a Luxor temple – and has called on Interpol to intervene.
Christie’s auction house sold the 28.5cm (11in) relic for £4,746,250 ($5,970,000) to an unknown buyer on 4 July at one of its most controversial auctions in years. The 28.5cm brown quartzite head was part of a statue of the ancient god Amun with the facial features of the young pharaoh Tutankhamun, who ruled Egypt between 1333BC and 1323BC. Similar statues were carved for the Temple of Karnak in the city of Thebes, now Luxor.
But less than a week after the sale, Egypt’s national committee for antiquities repatriation (NCAR) said after an urgent meeting that national prosecutors had asked the international police agency to issue a circular to trace such artefacts over alleged missing paperwork. The sculpture was sold last week along with 32 other Egyptian artefacts despite Egypt’s fierce objections. Christie’s said it had carried out “extensive due diligence” to verify the provenance of the relic, which fetched £4.7m.
“The committee expresses its deep discontent of the unprofessional behaviour of the sale of Egyptian antiquities without providing the ownership documents and the evidences that prove its legal export from Egypt,” the NCAR said in a statement. Egypt said on Tuesday it had asked Interpol to track the statue and other artefacts over alleged missing paperwork, and it criticised British authorities for not supporting its claim.
The committee – headed by the minister of antiquities, Khaled El-Enany, and attended by his predecessor, Zahi Hawass, and officials from various ministries – also called upon Britain to “prohibit the export of the sold artefacts” until the Egyptian authorities were shown the documents. The Egyptian National Committee for Antiquities Repatriation, which met on Monday, expressed its “deep discontent” at the “unprofessional way in which the Egyptian artefacts were sold without the provision of the ownership documents and proof that the artefacts left Egypt in a legitimate manner”.
It suggested the issue could have an impact on cultural relations by referencing “the ongoing cooperation between both countries in the field of archaeology, especially that there are 18 British archaeological missions working in Egypt”. The committee, headed by Egypt’s minister of antiquities, Khaled El-Enany, also expressed “deep bewilderment” at the lack of support from the British government, and called on Britain to prohibit the artefacts’ export until the documents had been produced.
The NCAR added it had hired a British law firm to file a civil lawsuit, although no further details were given. The statement appeared to suggest the issue could have an impact on cultural relations between Egypt and the UK, referring to “the ongoing cooperation between both countries in the field of archaeology, especially that there are 18 British archaeological missions working in Egypt”, AFP reported.
’Stolen from Karnak’ Egypt said it was instructing a British law firm to file a civil lawsuit over the sale and it would ask Interpol to issue a circular to “track down the illegal sale of Egyptian artefacts worldwide”.
The London sale of the head of “Boy King” Tutankhamun angered Egyptian officials at the time and sparked a protest outside Christie’s by demonstrators who held up signs reading “Stop trading in smuggled antiquities”. A former antiquities chief, Zahi Hawass, told AFP the head appeared to have been stolen from the Temple of Karnak. “The owners have given false information. They have not shown any legal papers to prove its ownership,” he said.
Hawass told AFP the piece appeared to have been “stolen” in the 1970s from the Karnak Temple complex north of Luxor and the Egyptian foreign ministry asked the UK Foreign Office and the UN cultural body Unesco to step in and halt the sale. Enany told the BBC he would try to repatriate the artefact. “They left us with no other option but to go to court to restore our smuggled antiquities,” the minister said. “We will leave no stone unturned until we repatriate the Tutankhamun bust and the other 32 pieces sold by Christie’s. This is human heritage that should be on public display in its country of origin.”
But such interventions are rare and made only when there is clear evidence of the item’s legitimate acquisition by the seller being in dispute. The sale last Thursday sparked a protest outside Christie’s. Demonstrators held signs reading: “Stop trading in smuggled antiquities.”
Christie’s argued that Egypt had never before expressed the same level of concern about an item whose existence has been “well known and exhibited publicly” for many years. Christie’s said the sale was was legal and valid and the relic had been “well published and exhibited in the last 30 years”.
“The object is not, and has not been, the subject of an investigation,” Christie’s said in a statement to AFP. It said: “While ancient objects by their nature cannot be traced over millennia, Christie’s clearly carried out extensive due diligence verifying the provenance and legal title, establishing facts of recent ownership.
The auction house has published a chronology of how the relic changed hands between European art dealers over the past 50 years and told AFP it would “not sell any work where there isn’t clear title of ownership”. “Christie’s would not and does not sell any work where there isn’t clear title of ownership and a thorough understanding of modern provenance.”
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It has published a chronology of how the relic changed hands between European art dealers over the past 50 years. It said Germany’s Prince Wilhelm von Thurn und Taxis reputedly had it in his collection by the 1960s and it was acquired by an Austrian dealer in 1973-4. The listing says the statue was acquired as part of a lot from a Munich-based dealer, Heinz Herzer.
Last December Italy’s highest court forced the Getty Museum in California to return an ancient Greek statue by the sculptor Lysippos to Italy after the museum paid Herzer almost $4m (£3.2m) for it in 1977.
A British government spokesperson said: “The relevant UK authorities have been and remain in regular communication with the Egyptian embassy in London.
“Christie’s is a private business and the government can only intervene in their operational matters if there is a clear basis in UK law to do so.”
The UK’s £30m Cultural Protection Fund includes a £1m project helping to create a database of Egyptian and Nubian artefacts currently in circulation on the international art market, and those held in private collections, to counteract looting and illegal trafficking.
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