This year alone, 5,300 monuments of ancient Egyptian civilization were uncovered at the Museum of the Bible in Washington.
Over the past 10 years, Egypt has managed to return to its homeland about 30 thousand artifacts stolen in different years, which were illegally smuggled out of the country. The chief inspector of the Department of Returned Antiquities of the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities of Egypt, Shaaban Abdel Gawad, announced this on the air of the Al-Hayat TV channel.
“Since 2011, the Egyptian state has managed to return 29,300 artifacts. This year alone, 5,300 monuments of ancient Egyptian civilization were discovered at the Museum of the Bible in Washington,” he said.
Abdel Gowad specified that all the artifacts smuggled out were registered in the archives. Now department employees are working on their return to Egypt – including tracking auctions around the world and online sales through foreign and Egyptian sites, as well as social networks.
The chief inspector said that upon their return, cultural values ​​are restored and then exhibited in museums.
According to him, one of the returned artifacts was an ancient human skeleton discovered in Belgium, which is now part of the exposition of the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization in Cairo.
In 2020, the Egyptian authorities approached Interpol with a request to help find the bust of King Tut, sold at an auction in London. The auction house Christie’s held an auction on July 4, at which a bust over 3000 years old was sold for $ 5.97 million (about 680 million rubles). This caused discontent on the part of Egypt.
The Egyptian side also claims that the piece of art was smuggled out of the Karnak Temple in Luxor in the 1970s. The head of Tutankhamun, depicted as the sun god Amun, was kept in a private collection and has not been put up for auction since 1985. How the relic got to Europe is unknown.
In recent years, Egypt has been actively seeking the repatriation of antiquities illegally exported from the country at different times. According to the authorities, 95% of the smuggled antiquities are the result of archaeological research by “black diggers”.
Back in 2018, Cyprus returned to Cairo 14 ancient artifacts stolen from Egypt in the 1980s. According to the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities, the exhibits were stolen and illegally taken from the country to the territory of Cyprus. They were later seized by the Cypriot authorities in Nicosia.
Among the antiquities recovered by Egypt are an alabaster vase with the name of Ramses II, as well as figurines of ushabti, which in Ancient Egypt were traditionally placed in the grave of the deceased: it was believed that in the afterlife they performed various works for him.
In addition, amulets made of various materials with the image of the goddesses Isis and Sekhmet, as well as the patroness of hunters and warriors, Neith, returned to their homeland. The process of repatriating artifacts from Cyprus to Egypt after a 30-year absence took about a year.
Photo: Bust of Tutankhamun / Reuters.
