U.S. District Judge Henry Autry has ruled that the St. Louis Art Museum may keep the 3,200-year-old funeral mask of Lady Ka-Nefer-Nefer, saying that the federal government, which requested that the museum return the mask to Egypt, failed to prove that it had been stolen. The St. Louis Art Museum purchased the mask from an art dealer in 1998.

Last year, Sotheby’s withdrew a tenth-century statue from auction at the request of the Cambodian government, but the auction house still has the statue, known as the Duryodhana, in its possession. Scholars believe the statue was stolen from the Prasat Chen Temple in Koh Ker sometime during the 1960s or 1970s and then sold into a private collection. Now, federal agents have threatened to seize the five-foot-tall sculpture.

In 1985, Robert Ballad, founder and president of the Institute for Exploration, and oceanographer Jean-Louis Michel, discovered the wreckage of the RMS Titanic. Ballard continues to advocate treating the wreck site with the respect due to a historic battlefield. “You don’t go to Gettysburg with a shovel. If we cannot protect the Titanic, what can we protect?” he asks.

Hiba al-Sakhel, director of museums in Syria, announced that the pace of looting has increased at Apamea, Palmyra, and other archaeological sites during the fighting and unrest over the past year. “In Apamea, we have a video showing looters removing mosaics with drills,” she said. Museums have also been robbed. Last month, UNESCO director general Irina Bokova urged member states to be on the lookout for artifacts smuggled out of Syria. “Damage to the heritage of the country is damage to the soul of its people and its identity,” she added.

In northwestern Peru, a team of archaeologists led by Regulo Franco has found an altar cut into the rock 3,250 feet up on Campana Hill. It is thought to have been constructed by the people of the Moche culture 1,500 years ago for human sacrifices, as depicted in Moche ceramics. The altar sits on a small platform accessible by three steps.

A small excavation at England’s York Minster hints at the many layers of area’s history, including two large post holes that may be traces of an early Christian church. Scholars know that King Edwin of Northumbria and his family were baptized in a wooden church in the seventh century, but the location of this first minster has never been identified. “I think they’ve got to be evidence for a significant structure – from a period when any evidence is incredibly rare and precious,” said Jim Williams, one of two archaeologists from York Archaeological Trust who are working at the site.

This entry was posted by Jessica E. Saraceni on Thursday, April 5, 2012. Discussion of this blog entry is now closed.

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