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Give Rosetta Stone to Egypt? | ||
Tags: Egypt | Rosetta Stone | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5521 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes  Speaks: Swedish* | Message 2 of 34 10 December 2009 at 8:49pm | IP Logged | ||
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I tend to thiik that even war booty should be kept, so it is easy for me to agree that the Rosetta Stone, which was not even stolen, should not be handed over to Egypt. I do think that the last statement is ludicrous, though:
"The Rosetta Stone is not a national icon, as Dr Hawass maintains, but an international symbol" This is of course irrelevant. People may feel that the Statue of Liberty or the Empire State Building are "international symbols" of modernism or greed (the good kind, capitalism) or whatever. That doesn't change who they belong to as material objects. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5838 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 3 of 34 10 December 2009 at 9:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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One problem with returning it is that it would set a precedent.
The Rosetta stone is just one of many important archeological finds which should arguably be returned to rightful owners. Every museum in the Western world, particularly Europe, is full of artifacts that do not originate in that country and that were acquired in questionable ways. Some things were even stolen twice; for example first by the Romans and then by the Vikings from a Roman settlement.. There are also examples of things which were first looted (more or less) by Victorian archeologists (for example) and later sold on to an American or Asian museum... Did they buy in good faith.. Or? I feel ambivalent about this... It's probably a real can of worms if you start poking in it. Museums would go broke or end up empty. On the other hand, obviously the artifacts could be said to morally belong to the descendants of the culture that created them. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5521 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 4 of 34 10 December 2009 at 9:57pm | IP Logged | ||
That is not really a tenable position. You have to take reason for the change of ownership into account. You should be able to buy or trade foreign objects without fearing that your descendants will risk having to return it. And why is it ok for archaeologist to desecrate graves? Why is that hailed as "science" while looting for financial gain is just looting? This is a thorny issue, but I certainly don't think we should return the Silver Bible, or even Scania. Maybe we could trade it for Norway? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7156 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 6 of 34 11 December 2009 at 1:43am | IP Logged | ||
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What bugs me about Hawass' (the Egyptian minister) statement is its haughty nationalist tone. Hawass' thinking is aligned with that of Egyptian nationalism which holds that Egyptians are distinct (or maybe even a cut above) relative to Arabs, even though Egypt's official language is Arabic, and its state religion is Islam.
He also comes off as if he's trying to present this dispute as a matter of Egypt versus the big, bad West. I would argue that the spread of Islam into the region and all of the population changes since then render any modern Egyptian claim of strong cultural, linguistic or "civilizational" continuity with Ancient Egypt as intellectually dishonest. This also seems no better than modern Italians who try to magnify their links to ancient Romans (with their paganism and imperial might) or modern Iranians who try to magnify their links to ancient Persians (with their Zoroastrianism and imperial might). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5838 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 7 of 34 11 December 2009 at 2:28am | IP Logged | ||
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I don't see anything wrong with this person being proud of his nationality and the history of his country. This has nothing to do with Islam. Neither do I have a problem with Italians associating themselves with Romans. They have every right and there were lots of good things about the Roman empire along with the bad.
If people of these two countries can't take pride in their history, then who can? I am sure that they are taught about both the good and the bad sides of these cultures in school there. Why should anyone find this provocative? I think his feelings about the Rosetta stone are entirely understandable - the trouble with accommodating his request is that it would start a trend that would mean that every country would demand to the same courtesy. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| genini1 Senior Member United States Joined 5468 days ago 114 posts - 161 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 8 of 34 11 December 2009 at 3:50am | IP Logged | ||
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This just brings up a huge can of worms that cannot be answered such as Rome controlled a huge part of Europe should artifacts created in their province's be treated as Roman and given to Italy or go to the country that eventually became their. In Egypt's case the argument of it belonging to their country is stupid. Egypt has been invaded and had the population changed far to many times for the country as it is to claim that anything that was ever made there as it's possession.
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