Derek Fincham

Massive Recovery of Anglo-Saxon Gold Announced

Below is some video of the massive discovery of Anglo-Saxon gold discovered by a detectorist this summer.

Two things to note from the piece: First is that these objects were very near the surface, and may have been at risk from pesticides/agricultural damage. Second, the finder here notified the proper authorities, and an archaeological excavation was made possible. There is a terrific website devoted to the objects, with a number of images and links to news reports. It is hard I think for even the most ardent critics of the Portable Antiquities Scheme to find much fault with the result in this case. The objects have a history, archaeological excavation was undertaken, and the public can study and enjoy these terrific objects.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Armed Theft of a Magritte

Earlier today armed robbers stole this work, Olympia by Rene Magritte from an appointment-only museum just outside of Brussels today. The men rang the bell, asked if visiting hours had started, and then put a gun to the attendant and rounded up the visitors, and stole the work.

No word yet on if they were wearing bowler hats. Magritte painted the work with the man in the hat and an apple in front of his face, the Son of Man — an image which was prominently used in the Thomas Crown Affair. It seems unlikely thieves would risk punishment to re-enact a film, so why was the painting taken? There are a few oft-cited possibilities:

The first, is that a collector admires the piece, and hired a thief to take it for him. We can call this the Dr. No situation. This seems the least likely possibility, but the one that strikes a chord with the imagination. Writers in this subject frequently cite the Dr. No as being responsible for thefts, and I admit it makes for good Bond villains, but there has been no convincing evidence that thsi is why people are stealing rare objects. Another similar possibility which seems far more likely is that an unscrupulous dealer may have a similar piece for sale, and if he can establish some excitement around these kinds of pieces, the price for his similar work may go up.

Second, the thief may not have known that the object was so rare as to make its subsequent sale difficult.

Third, the thief may simply be trying to kidnap the object. They could then insure its safe return for a generous reward, or negotiate its return.

Finally, perhaps the market is doing such a poor job of regulating what is and is not legitimate, that it may not be all that difficult to sell this piece after all. This strikes me as the most troubling possibility, but also not very likely.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Lost Work Discovered

This work, Madonna and Child with St. Joseph, by Ludovico Mazzolino has been rediscovered after being left in storage for nearly 60 years. A photograph of the work was sent to an auctioneer, who identified it as the work of Mazzolino. It seems this work is genuine, and has a solid history. Guy Schwinge, an auctioneer at Duke’s of Dorchester said:

“With the help of the National Gallery we have been able to identify that it was last sold at public auction three years before Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo.“

The seller is a pensioner from Cheltenham, who put the work into storage in 1950. He received it from his great grandmother who bought it in Italy in 1862, and it had been sold at auction in London in 1812 for only £20.

Lost Renaissance Work Discovered [BBC News, Sep. 21, 2009].

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Viking Silver Discovered by Metal Detectorists on Display in York

Vale of York Hoard vessel. Picture by the British Museum

This hoard of viking silver — buried in the 10th century — was discovered by Metal detector David Whelan and his son Andrew in a field in 2007. Included in the find were 617 coins and 67 other objects. The treasure was valued at over £1m. They went on public display in York last week. Andrew Morrison, curator of archaeology at the York Museums Trust tells the BBC what we know about the silver and the role it played in the Anglo-Scandinavian economy:

“We can certainly say it’s an Anglo-Scandinavian hoard because of the contents,” Mr Morrison insists. Among the coins are dirhams from Muslim states as far away as central Asia and Afghanistan. “What they’re showing you is trading links. That tends to be very much more the Viking side of life than the Anglo-Saxon side of life,” says Mr Morrison. The Scandinavian seagoing peoples travelled and traded far and wide The presence of “hack silver” – items such as jewellery cut into pieces for their silver value – is also “what you expect from an Anglo-Scandinavian economy,” he adds. The Anglo-Saxons tended to use coins rather than bullion. The hoard will be on show in York from 17 September until 1 November. It will return to the British Museum while the Yorkshire Museum closes for refurbishment until August 2010. It will then return to York for “a period of time” – by which time the whole hoard, including all 617 coins, should be ready to go on display. For Mr Morrison this co-operation between regional and national museums is “the way forward – you get the best of everything: the local input into ways of doing things, with the national expertise”. The hoard, for him, has a personal feel – it gives clues about whoever it was who hid it. The single gold arm ring among the mass of silver items could well have been of great sentimental value to its owner, he believes. Possibly it was a reward for services given by a superior ruler. In sum, he says: “This is the lifetime’s treasure of a reasonably wealthy individual.” It also helps us to remember what a wealthy and prestigious place Northumbria, centred on York, was, he observes – sometimes in the richness of archaeological finds in the city and its surroundings “we forget how it is a place with the seeds of power and glory.”

Silver-gilt vessel from the Vale of York Hoard. Inset: before cleaning. Photo: British Museum.

In an ideal world of course all these objects would be professionally excavated. Yet these objects tell us a great deal about the culture which produced them, they can be enjoyed by scholars and the public in York and at the British Museum. Contrast this with the Sevso Treasure, which is locked away at Bonham’s auction house. Three nations of origin, each with national ownership declarations and no similar rewards for finders, fought over those works, and the result was the trust created by the Marquess of Northampton was able to retain possession. Whatever criticisms can be lodged with the Treasure Act and the Portable Antiquities Scheme, they reward compliance. They work. We still know very little about the Sevso Treasure, who discovered, and where. The current state of law and policy produces a perfect black market. The PAS offers a good alternative. What is the utility of a legal regime which cannot be enforced?

I’ve argued that the PAS has a lot of merit, and should be considered as a potential policy model for other nations. Rick Witschonke, reported on a conference earlier this month at the British Museum on the Portable Antiquities Scheme, and his thoughts are here.

Trevor Timpson, The ‘wonderful, wonderful’ hoard & Getting the most out of treasure [BBC Sep. 17, 2009].

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Odyssey Marine Salvage Award

One nation’s underwater looters are another nation’s excavators-for-hire. Dow Jones Newswires is reporting that Odyssey Marine will receive a $160,000 award for recovering artifacts for the U.K. from the English Channel:

Odyssey Marine Exploration Inc. (OMEX) will receive a salvage award of $160,000 in a settlement with the U.K. government for artifacts recovered so far from a gunship wreck in the English Channel.The company – which uses advanced technology to comb the ocean’s depths for silver, gold and historical artifacts – also has filed a motion to vacate its admiralty arrest on the wreck in U.S. federal court. An admiralty arrest is a legal proceeding by which Odyssey seeks court recognition of its right to salvage a ship.Shares recently were up 14% at $2.33 in recent premarket trading. Still, that’s far below its all-time high of $8.32 a share in May 2007, shortly after a separate major discovery in the Atlantic Ocean, which led to a legal dispute with Spain. Shares lost two-thirds of their value in one day in June after Odyssey was recommended to return an estimated $500 million in sunken cargo. The case is still pending.The U.K. salvage award represents about 80% of the value of two cannon recovered from Admiral Balchin’s HMS Victory, a British Navy 100 gun ship lost in 1744 and submitted to the U.K. Receiver of Wreck. The company plans to contribute $75,000 of the award to support the National Museum of the Royal Navy.The company also will be involved in talks to determine approaches that should be adopted towards the wreck. Odyssey has booked losses in every year except one since it went public in 1997, but has loyal investors confident in its long-term prospects. The company generates revenue by selling artifacts and coins, from a partnership with the Discovery Channel and from leasing fees for traveling museum exhibits. The HMS Victory is one of Odyssey’s significant finds and sank in a storm with 41 bronze cannons and other artifacts aboard.Odyssey in April had admiralty arrest on about a dozen sites.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Redds Sentenced to Probation

Jeanne and Jericca Redd (pictured here with their attorney) have been sentenced in the federal artifact-looting investigation. They are the first to be sentenced, there are at least 26 other potential criminal defendants. U.S. District Court Judge Waddous sentenced Jeanne Redd to 36 months’s probation and a $2,000 fine, and her daughter Jericca to 24 months’ probatoin and a $300 fine. Federal prosecutors had recommended 18 months in prison for Jeanne. Jeanne pleaded guilty to seven felonies, two counts of violating the Archaeological Resources Protection Act, two counts of theft, and three counts of theft of tribal property. Each one of those counts carried a potential fine of $250,000 and 10 years in prison. The younger Redd admitted to three felonies for digging up a seed jar, a vase, and a vessel on the Navajo reservation. Over 800 objects, including human remains were seized from the Redds.

However Judge Waddous said “This is a community where this kind of conduct . . . has been justified for a number of years . . . This is a woman who has spent her life as a member of her community . . . I want to express my thanks, . . . I know this has been a terrible experience for all of you.”
Judge Waddons is referring to the suicide of James Redd earlier this summer, and that seems to have had a substantial impact on the sentencing. It is also a general rule in sentencing that when a defendant pleads guilty, a prosecutor will recommend a much lesser sentence, but in this case the sentence fell far short of the sentence recommended by the prosecutors.

George Hardeen, a spokeseman for Navajo Nation president Joe Shirley Jr. said “The Navajo people are compassionate toward others who have had a tragic loss as the Redd family have . . . At the same time, Navajos have a deep respect for burials and ruins and teach that these are not to be disturbed. Obviously, Navajos want them left alone and not looted for their artifacts.”

In an interview on NPR this morning Mark Michel of the Archeological Conservancy said “The sentence is disappointing . . . And I’m afraid it sends a message that this is not serious criminal activity.”

U.S. Attorney Richard McKelvie saw it another way, “I can’t imagine anybody willfully subjecting themselves to anything the Redds have gone through . . . You can’t ignore the consequences that these people have suffered as a result of the investigation and prosecution of this case.”

These sentences are certainly on the light side, but even if the judge had thrown the “book” at the Redds and all the other defendants, would that have a sustained impact on the preservation of the archaeological record in the Southwest? It may, or it may produce a backlash. Criminal penalties are an important component, but criminal penalties in isolation will not solve the problem. There are very different ways of valuing these sites and objects, and increased awareness of how important and valuable the archaeological record is are critical components of this process.

Howard Berkes, Mother, Daughter Get Probation In Artifacts Theft [NPR, Sep. 16, 2009].
Patty Henetz, Redds dodge prison in artifact sentencing [The Salt Lake Tribune, Sep. 17, 2009].

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Nine Double Eagle Coins

Roy Langbord discovered in 2003 that his family had 9 of these rare double eagle coins locked away in a safe-deposit box:

The famous “double eagles” from that year were never officially released by the government. Only a few had ever made their way out of federal vaults, and only one had ever been sold publicly, in 2002. The price: $7.6 million. And there were nine more of them in the safe-deposit box. But after the Langbord family took the coins to the United States Mint to be authenticated in 2004, they got a rude surprise. The Mint said the coins were genuine and kept them. The government claims that they are government property stolen from the Mint, most likely in the 1930s, by Mr. Langbord’s grandfather, Israel Switt, a Philadelphia jewelry dealer. The Langbords went to court and recently won an important ruling. A United States District Court judge has given the government until the end of the month either to give back the coins or go back to court to prove that they were in fact stolen by Mr. Switt, a daunting task after three-quarters of a century. Nearly a half-million 1933 double eagles were minted before President Franklin D. Roosevelt, shifting the nation away from the gold standard, issued an executive order that made owning large amounts of gold bullion and coins illegal. Two of the coins went to the Smithsonian Institution, and almost all the rest were melted down.

The Federal government believes the coins were stolen, and it seems unlikely these coins ever found their way to the marketplace legitimately, but the government will have to prove these coins were stolen, 75 years after they were ordered to be melted down.

John Schwartz, Rare Coins: Family Treasure or Ill-Gotten Goods? [New York Times, Sep. 15, 2009].

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Undoing a Sale to HItler

The Austrian Culture Ministry has revealed that it has received a formal request for the restitution of this work, The Art of Painting by Johannes Vermeer. The family of Jaromir Czernin has urged its return for nearly 40 years, but the Austrian authorities refused on the grounds the sale was voluntary. However an attorney for the Czernin family argues the work was sold to guarantee the safety of Czernin and his family. The work was sold to Hitler in 1940 for 1.65 million Reichsmark. Irrespective of the outcome of this request, arguing Hitler purchased the disputed work is not exactly the kind of publicity Austria’s Kunsthistorisches Museum would enjoy.

Philippe Schwab, Vienna museum fears restitution of stolen Vermeer [AFP, Sep. 13, 2009].

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

No Libraries in Philadelphia?

We get the State and City we deserve. Another sign of the dismal state of liberal arts funding generally. If the Pennsylvania State Legislature doesn’t allocate funds, the Philadelphia Free Library will close on October 2nd and end all programs and services. All books are due on October 1st.

The Pennsylvania senate is unable to pass a budget, and this late-arriving state funding will force the closure of the entire system. Perhaps a Pirate Party can fill the void for the citizens of Philadelphia to get access to books, movies and music.

All Free Library of Philadelphia Branch, Regional and Central Libraries Closed Effective Close of Business October 2, 2009 [Free Library of Philadelphia]

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Early Review of the Art of the Steal

The Art of the Steal is a new documentary on the Barnes foundation and its planned move from Merion. Scott Tobias has a review for the AV Club:

As a forward-thinking art collector in the ‘20s, Dr. Albert Barnes snapped up an extraordinary wealth of post-impressionist and modernist paintings from the likes of Matisse, Picasso, Renoir, and Cezanne; though dismissed by tastemakers at the time, his collection is now valued in the tens of billions. In his will, Dr. Barnes was very specific about what the trustees were to do with his assets: He wanted them to remain housed in his small, meticulously conceived institution in the Philadelphia suburb of Merion, never to be loaned out or sold to other museums. He wanted the Barnes trustees to continue his educational mission. And most of all, he wanted to make sure the corporate foundations and politicians in Philly didn’t get their grubby paws on it. The Art Of The Steal is about how Barnes’ seemingly ironclad wishes were withered away by unscrupulous trustees, coffer-draining legal battles, and the overwhelming force of a city looking to bring in the tourist dollar. There are two sides of the story—the other being that the Barnes Foundation simply didn’t have the capital to be a sustainable entity—but the film makes its allegiances clear. And that’s not a bad thing: In this David and Goliath story, Goliath kicks the ever loving shit out of David, and the film is convincing and righteous in its advocacy. It also leaves you with troubling questions about the runaway commodification of art, the extent to which it does or does not belong the public, and just how much power the individual really has in society. Grade: B

Toronto Film Festival ’09: Day 4 [AV Club].

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com