For decades, three prized items told stories of ancient Mesopotamia from behind museum glass in foreign lands. Now, they are heading home to Iraq as part of a global push to retrieve antiquities that were looted and sold around the world over the centuries.
The Iraqi embassy in Washington announced it has recovered three rare artefacts dating back to the Sumer and Babylonian civilisations millennia ago. It hailed the transfer from New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art as a “new milestone in the country’s ongoing diplomatic efforts to protect its cultural heritage”.
Museum officials say the artefacts include a Sumerian container, depicting two rams, that is made of gypsum alabaster, a type of mineral and soft rock. The other items are Babylonian ceramic sculptures of the heads of a man and a woman. They date from the third to second millennium BC, a museum statement said.
The two rams sculpture originates from between 2600 BC and 2500 BC, while the carving of the woman's head dates from 2000 BC to 1600 BC. Both were given to the museum in 1989 by the Norbert Schimmel Trust. The head of the male, dating back to around 2000 BC to 1600 BC, was bought by the museum in 1972.
The male head and container with rams were previously sold by notorious British antiquities dealer Robin Symes, who in 2016 was accused by Italian authorities of being involved in an international criminal network trading in looted archaeological treasures. He died in October 2023.
Both the heads are thought to be from Isin, an archaeological site in southern Iraq, while the ram sculpture is not known to be associated with a particular area. The latter appeared on the Baghdad art market and was bought by Swiss dealer Nicolas Koutoulakis in 1956 before being acquired by Cecile de Rothschild.
The return to Iraq is part of the Met museum’s Cultural Property Initiative which was launched in 2023 and includes a review of works in its collection. Several artefacts have been returned to their places of origin in various countries since.
“The Met is committed to the responsible collecting of art and the shared stewardship of the world’s cultural heritage and has made significant investments in accelerating the proactive research of our collection,” said Max Hollein, museum director and chief executive.
“The museum is grateful for our ongoing conversations with Iraq regarding future collaborative endeavours, and we look forward to working together to advance our shared dedication to fostering knowledge and appreciation of Iraqi art and culture."
The Iraqi embassy said the return of the artefacts "is seen as a contribution to safeguarding Iraq’s historical memory and a reflection of both Iraqi and global pride in this unique human heritage".
Decades of war, instability, lack of security and mismanagement have taken their toll on Iraq’s heritage, art and culture.
After the 1991 Gulf War, when a US-led international coalition repelled Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait and the UN imposed economic sanctions, illegal archaeological digs became widespread, mainly in remote areas that troops were unable to secure.
With the fall of Baghdad during a similar invasion that ended Saddam's regime in 2003, looters broke into the Iraqi National Museum and made off with priceless artefacts, only a few thousand of which have been recovered.
Looters continue to dig at unprotected archaeological sites in Iraq, leading to hundreds of artefacts showing up on the worldwide market. But with the help of the international community, Iraq has managed to retrieve thousands of items of stolen heritage from around the world in recent years, mainly from the US.
