This is a somewhat strange one from the AP (via Yahoo):
... now I'm not sure whether this editorial in the Opinion Journal from back in December (when the Museum Case was just in its infancy) was previously available online to non-subscribers, but it has a rather portentous paragraph:
The issue just became rather more complicated ... I'm sure there will be a 'conspiracy theory' popping up on this soon.
Two pieces from the treasure of King Croesus that were returned to Turkey from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York after a long legal battle have been stolen and replaced with fakes, the culture and tourism minister said Sunday.
Croesus' golden broach in the shape of a sea horse and a coin were switched with replicas at the Usak Museum in western Turkey, said the minister Atilla Koc, confirming a newspaper report on Sunday. "Unfortunately the incident is true," Koc said.
Croesus, the 6th century B.C. king of the Lydians, was the richest man of his time in what is now western Turkey. Ever since, his name has been synonymous with great wealth.
The broach was one of 363 artifacts from the so-called "Lydian Hoard" that was purchased by the Metropolitan Museum in the 1960s. Some 30 years later, the museum acknowledged that it knew the pieces were stolen when it purchased them, and returned them to Turkey.
... now I'm not sure whether this editorial in the Opinion Journal from back in December (when the Museum Case was just in its infancy) was previously available online to non-subscribers, but it has a rather portentous paragraph:
Yet it's hard to gloat over the current public humiliation of American museums. Could there be a worse time for the U.S. to be depicted as an imperial bullyboy looting the patrimony of poorer lands? In the current climate, that so many American institutions have done so much to preserve the world's heritage will be instantly eclipsed. But above all, the polarization between museums and aggrieved nations serves neither side's interests. The latter often don't have the resources to conserve or display returned treasures, let alone protect them in the ground. (The Lydian Hoard sits neglected and half-unpacked in a small museum in rural Turkey.) For their part, American museums will spend the next decades terrified about losing every object in their antiquities vitrines.
The issue just became rather more complicated ... I'm sure there will be a 'conspiracy theory' popping up on this soon.