7 ms·

The Goddess Complex

47 points by Thevet 3y ago

readthenotes1 3y ago
On an ancient temple near Bangalaru, I saw a small metal sign nailed on that warned of a 500 rupee fine for defacement. I wondered if the worker who had affixed the rusty plaque had paid the fine.
mapcars 3y ago
Poor western mind can not understand that instead of stealing stuff you can just learn how to do it properly and produce those in thousands to fill all the museums, collections, buildings streets and everything you wish. I had visited India for a little bit and it was enough to be amazed by the level of craftsmanship that exists today despite all of the automation tools etc. From statues, architecture to clothes, foods, all sorts of items and objects. There is lots and lots to learn here.
- dmreedy 3y ago
  The mindset that leads an empire to pilfer its territories and conquests is a bit more complicated than some lack of artisanship or productive culture back home, to meet some perceived economic demand. I think it's much more closer (though still aggressively reductionist) to model it in your head as base exoticism trophy-taking. Look at the strange works of these lesser beings, and remember that we defeated them.
cgio 3y ago
From the article: "The repatriated artifacts are not as well known as the Benin Bronzes, for example, plundered from West Africa by British colonists, or the Parthenon marbles, removed by Lord Elgin in the early 1800s and now on display at the British Museum. They are not symbols of empire, nor are they the spoils of war." A note, that Parthenon marbles were also plundered, and destructively so, rather than just "removed" and, contrary to what is implied in the latter sentence, they were not spoils of war. They were spoils of spoiled aristocrats.
- polotics 3y ago
  Parthenon marbles were taken by lord Elgin with authorisation from the Muslim Ottoman invaders that were holding Greece at the time. The Ottoman's purpose was to destroy any marker of civilization in the land they had invaded. At the same time some other brits, notably lord Byron, were fighting the war for Greece's independence against the Ottomans.
  - coldtea 3y ago
    >The Ottoman's purpose was to destroy any marker of civilization in the land they had invaded. They did a very bad job at it then. It's the British and Elgin who did the real huge damage to the Parthenon (plus some damage by Venetians, but at least that was accidental). And then the Bavarians, who destoyed hundreds of byzantine churches in the Athens area, and even had plans of building a new palace atop the Acropolis. So, after 4 centuries of Ottoman occupation, with ocassional brutal incidents, and still most of the damage to the Parthenon happened by "englightened" westerners (who didn't have the decency to return the spoils after 2 centuries of independent Greece).
    - fallingknife 3y ago
      Return to who? The city state of Athens? Or are you suggesting that whoever governs the land at the time is the owner? If that's the case then their sale by the ottomans to Elgin was legitimate, and therefore the rightful owner is the UK.
      - coldtea 3y ago
        >If that's the case then their sale by the ottomans to Elgin was legitimate, and therefore the rightful owner is the UK. I'm suggesting that no such destruction of an archaelogical site and sale of historical artifacts to another country (even less so an individual buyer) is legitimate or ethical, regardless of whether it was approved by the occupying force at the time. Regardless of the matter of "continuity of the state" and the legitimacy of the state of the time (or lack thereof), there's the matter of where those artifacts belong to, and where the claim lies, and this is not just about the technical legality of the sale. A great many scholars, archeologists, and public intellectuals from Britain have addressed those issue. Especially when the population of the land they've been plundered from has gained its freedom and has been asking to have them returned for over a century. Even worse when part of Greece was shamefully under British colonial rule at the time of the sale. https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/nov/04/art-worlds-shame-parthenon-elgin-marbles-british-museums https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2... https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30810596 https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30810596
bombolo 3y ago
relevant last week tonight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJPLiT1kCSM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJPLiT1kCSM
NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
Imagine if Egyptian law enforcement had the wherewithal to go after every nation and organization that's plundered their funereal monuments. It could end up as a Kohi-Noor-level tug-of-war. Except unlike the stone matrikas, many Egyptian artifacts were friable, like mummies and their wrappings. In other news, the Holy See has donated fragments of the True Cross to England for use in the coronation of King Charles III. Imagine how many True Crosses you could assemble if you gathered all their fragments together.
- BoxOfRain 3y ago
  Wasn't a fragment of the True Cross rumoured to have gone down with the Moskva last year?
- viciousvoxel 3y ago
  This reminds me of the saying, "you could build a cathedral with all the pieces of the 'True' Cross," which I believe originated in Medieval Christendom. Even back then it was widely known that many, if not most, religious relics were probably fake.
  - dalbasal 3y ago
    ..if not all. And they certainly knew it then too. Maybe they didn't really care, and had a similar view to us about the matter. I don't think anyone believes the Vatican is sending actual true cross relics for the coronation. Still, the fact that the artefact has been a fake relic for 1000 years, has a history, is being sent by the pope... those are enough for it to function as a symbol. I think it's always ironically hard, with history, to know if the mindset was different or similar to ours. Ancient economies sometimes seem to work in ways that ours wouldn't for mindset reasons. Other times things are more similar to our times than we suppose. I think we're bad at recognising which parts of our own culture are unique and novel, and which are relatively trivial, common, or even inherent.
    - dmreedy 3y ago
      Indeed. As the line goes: the past is a foreign country, they do things differently there. Equally human, equally logical, but with different priors, different axioms, different base truths to reason from. > Maybe they didn't really care, and had a similar view to us about the matter. My impression is that this is probably not the case however. Another line following from the above is that ancient people believed their religions, with the same unexamined priors as we believe in our own modern Truths. But since they were human, too, there is always room for charlatanism, fraud, and delusions of grandeur. And humor as a defensive mechanism against all of that.
hillsboroughman 3y ago
Museums, as a concept, rest on a supply chain of plunder and pillage in the past and now increasingly, on theft, dubious commercial transactions etc.. No one can deny that local people and shady businessmen have been hand in glove with art collectors, dubious art historians and international smugglers, for thefts to happen on such a large scale. The situation can improve if ordinary people feel within their hearts that museums by and large house stolen art from, usually, poorer countries. People should really stop visiting museums like the Met and LACMA. Otherwise they would just be encouraging past patterns of behavior.
- bombolo 3y ago
  Some civilizations actually did produce art that can be displayed in a museum locally (if the british forgot to steal it)
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
transfire 3y ago
Unfortunately economic incentives are still the driving force -- not some high moral sense. The pieces now have value for the origin countries, ironically, BECAUSE THEY WERE STOLEN. So they are using litigation to get them back. The lawyers are getting paid well and eventually, I suspect, most are just resold.
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  I think India at least will eventually get everything back, that's been identified at least, due to political circumstances.
kordlessagain 3y ago
Plugging away on a PDF to GPT interaction project for Github. Printed the page and ran it through. > What is this about? > This text is about a complicated history of the Tanesar sculptures, particularly a sculpture of the goddess Matrika, and how it became part of the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It details how the sculptures were illegally trafficked and acquired by the Wiener family and how the District Attorney's office uncovered the smuggling rings. It also discusses the idea of restitution and repatriation of the sculptures and the need for open dialogue about what is best for the sculptures.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
amriksohata 3y ago
So much was looted from India

47 points by Thevet 3y ago

On an ancient temple near Bangalaru, I saw a small metal sign nailed on that warned of a 500 rupee fine for defacement. I wondered if the worker who had affixed the rusty plaque had paid the fine.

mapcars 3y ago

Poor western mind can not understand that instead of stealing stuff you can just learn how to do it properly and produce those in thousands to fill all the museums, collections, buildings streets and everything you wish. I had visited India for a little bit and it was enough to be amazed by the level of craftsmanship that exists today despite all of the automation tools etc. From statues, architecture to clothes, foods, all sorts of items and objects. There is lots and lots to learn here.

dmreedy 3y ago
The mindset that leads an empire to pilfer its territories and conquests is a bit more complicated than some lack of artisanship or productive culture back home, to meet some perceived economic demand. I think it's much more closer (though still aggressively reductionist) to model it in your head as base exoticism trophy-taking. Look at the strange works of these lesser beings, and remember that we defeated them.

cgio 3y ago

From the article: "The repatriated artifacts are not as well known as the Benin Bronzes, for example, plundered from West Africa by British colonists, or the Parthenon marbles, removed by Lord Elgin in the early 1800s and now on display at the British Museum. They are not symbols of empire, nor are they the spoils of war." A note, that Parthenon marbles were also plundered, and destructively so, rather than just "removed" and, contrary to what is implied in the latter sentence, they were not spoils of war. They were spoils of spoiled aristocrats.

polotics 3y ago
Parthenon marbles were taken by lord Elgin with authorisation from the Muslim Ottoman invaders that were holding Greece at the time. The Ottoman's purpose was to destroy any marker of civilization in the land they had invaded. At the same time some other brits, notably lord Byron, were fighting the war for Greece's independence against the Ottomans.
- coldtea 3y ago
  >The Ottoman's purpose was to destroy any marker of civilization in the land they had invaded. They did a very bad job at it then. It's the British and Elgin who did the real huge damage to the Parthenon (plus some damage by Venetians, but at least that was accidental). And then the Bavarians, who destoyed hundreds of byzantine churches in the Athens area, and even had plans of building a new palace atop the Acropolis. So, after 4 centuries of Ottoman occupation, with ocassional brutal incidents, and still most of the damage to the Parthenon happened by "englightened" westerners (who didn't have the decency to return the spoils after 2 centuries of independent Greece).
  - fallingknife 3y ago
    Return to who? The city state of Athens? Or are you suggesting that whoever governs the land at the time is the owner? If that's the case then their sale by the ottomans to Elgin was legitimate, and therefore the rightful owner is the UK.
    - coldtea 3y ago
      >If that's the case then their sale by the ottomans to Elgin was legitimate, and therefore the rightful owner is the UK. I'm suggesting that no such destruction of an archaelogical site and sale of historical artifacts to another country (even less so an individual buyer) is legitimate or ethical, regardless of whether it was approved by the occupying force at the time. Regardless of the matter of "continuity of the state" and the legitimacy of the state of the time (or lack thereof), there's the matter of where those artifacts belong to, and where the claim lies, and this is not just about the technical legality of the sale. A great many scholars, archeologists, and public intellectuals from Britain have addressed those issue. Especially when the population of the land they've been plundered from has gained its freedom and has been asking to have them returned for over a century. Even worse when part of Greece was shamefully under British colonial rule at the time of the sale. https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/nov/04/art-worlds-shame-parthenon-elgin-marbles-british-museums https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2... https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30810596 https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30810596

bombolo 3y ago

relevant last week tonight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJPLiT1kCSM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJPLiT1kCSM

NoZebra120vClip 3y ago

Imagine if Egyptian law enforcement had the wherewithal to go after every nation and organization that's plundered their funereal monuments. It could end up as a Kohi-Noor-level tug-of-war. Except unlike the stone matrikas, many Egyptian artifacts were friable, like mummies and their wrappings. In other news, the Holy See has donated fragments of the True Cross to England for use in the coronation of King Charles III. Imagine how many True Crosses you could assemble if you gathered all their fragments together.

BoxOfRain 3y ago
Wasn't a fragment of the True Cross rumoured to have gone down with the Moskva last year?
viciousvoxel 3y ago
This reminds me of the saying, "you could build a cathedral with all the pieces of the 'True' Cross," which I believe originated in Medieval Christendom. Even back then it was widely known that many, if not most, religious relics were probably fake.
- dalbasal 3y ago
  ..if not all. And they certainly knew it then too. Maybe they didn't really care, and had a similar view to us about the matter. I don't think anyone believes the Vatican is sending actual true cross relics for the coronation. Still, the fact that the artefact has been a fake relic for 1000 years, has a history, is being sent by the pope... those are enough for it to function as a symbol. I think it's always ironically hard, with history, to know if the mindset was different or similar to ours. Ancient economies sometimes seem to work in ways that ours wouldn't for mindset reasons. Other times things are more similar to our times than we suppose. I think we're bad at recognising which parts of our own culture are unique and novel, and which are relatively trivial, common, or even inherent.
  - dmreedy 3y ago
    Indeed. As the line goes: the past is a foreign country, they do things differently there. Equally human, equally logical, but with different priors, different axioms, different base truths to reason from. > Maybe they didn't really care, and had a similar view to us about the matter. My impression is that this is probably not the case however. Another line following from the above is that ancient people believed their religions, with the same unexamined priors as we believe in our own modern Truths. But since they were human, too, there is always room for charlatanism, fraud, and delusions of grandeur. And humor as a defensive mechanism against all of that.

hillsboroughman 3y ago

Museums, as a concept, rest on a supply chain of plunder and pillage in the past and now increasingly, on theft, dubious commercial transactions etc.. No one can deny that local people and shady businessmen have been hand in glove with art collectors, dubious art historians and international smugglers, for thefts to happen on such a large scale. The situation can improve if ordinary people feel within their hearts that museums by and large house stolen art from, usually, poorer countries. People should really stop visiting museums like the Met and LACMA. Otherwise they would just be encouraging past patterns of behavior.

bombolo 3y ago
Some civilizations actually did produce art that can be displayed in a museum locally (if the british forgot to steal it)

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

transfire 3y ago

Unfortunately economic incentives are still the driving force -- not some high moral sense. The pieces now have value for the origin countries, ironically, BECAUSE THEY WERE STOLEN. So they are using litigation to get them back. The lawyers are getting paid well and eventually, I suspect, most are just resold.

MichaelZuo 3y ago
I think India at least will eventually get everything back, that's been identified at least, due to political circumstances.

kordlessagain 3y ago

Plugging away on a PDF to GPT interaction project for Github. Printed the page and ran it through. > What is this about? > This text is about a complicated history of the Tanesar sculptures, particularly a sculpture of the goddess Matrika, and how it became part of the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It details how the sculptures were illegally trafficked and acquired by the Wiener family and how the District Attorney's office uncovered the smuggling rings. It also discusses the idea of restitution and repatriation of the sculptures and the need for open dialogue about what is best for the sculptures.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

amriksohata 3y ago

So much was looted from India