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Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

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Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#221

Post by mcv »

vondur wrote: post #87
deathgrips wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a tragedy. Most westerners don't realize that when Europeans were living in mud huts and emptying their chamber pots into the streets, the Muslim world had plumbing, water filtration, surgery, advanced mathematics, and many more amazing scientific advances which quickly spread throughout Muslim countries due to the cultural exchange at Mecca. I wonder what the world could have been like if the Mongols had never…

The Eastern Romans had it too, as it never ceased to exist in the East. However, I don't think the original Muslim Arabs had any of those technologies, the states they conquered did. (Roman and Persian)

Conquering something doesn't mean you automatically get to keep it. Systems need to be maintained.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#222

Post by mcv »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #142
ctdonath wrote: post #131

NYTimes: "In a lawsuit filed on Tuesday, Hobby Lobby accused the auction house Christie’s of “deceitful and fraudulent conduct” in connection with an ancient tablet bearing a fragment of Gilgamesh. The suit claims “fraud and breach of express and implied warrant” in connection with the tablet, and seeks the return of what it paid for the tablet. In a statement on Tuesday, Christie’s said the lawsuit was related to an…

>Interesting how few are interested in the defense that Hobby Lobby was a victim. They weren't. With this tablet, maybe they never had any solid reason to suspect it had been looted. This wasn't the only artifact they bought, other items had no documentation detailing their history and they made purchases after being warned that items were likely illegal. It's doubtful they tried very hard to verify this tablets hist…

Why are such auctions even allowed? Or was this an illegal auction? It seems to me that any respectable auction house has an obligation to ensure that their service is not abused to fence stolen goods.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#224

Post by chx »

legerdemain wrote: post #8

One of the outcomes of the US-Iraq war was Iraq's national heritage of antiquities getting plundered and sold illegally.[1] The burning of the Library of Alexandria is a potent symbol in Western culture, but the world has repeatedly suffered massive losses of cultural and historical artifacts in the last few decades. The public quickly develops historical amnesia for recent events. Compare, for example, the loss of B…

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/5t6op5/facts...

> > I am curious about what knowledge was lost in the fire,

> Probably next to nothing, and certainly nothing of importance was lost. Alexandria was hardly the only library in the world, and the libraries at Pergamum and later Rome herself rivaled Alexandria in scale. Antony replaced the losses of the fire during the Alexandrine War with copies made from the library at Pergamum, and libraries in gymnasia or simply founded for citizens abound during that period in the Greek world, they're in like literally every city of any size.

> We do not lose texts because of catastrophic events that wipe out all copies of them. We lose texts because they stop being copied.

Also check https://www.ancient.eu/article/207/what-happened-to-the-grea...

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#226

Post by brokenkebab »

deathgrips wrote: post #35
keiferski wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The destruction of Baghdad itself, including the House of Wisdom (large library), by the Mongols in 1258 is probably a more apt comparison. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Wisdom https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Baghdad_(1258)

What a tragedy. Most westerners don't realize that when Europeans were living in mud huts and emptying their chamber pots into the streets, the Muslim world had plumbing, water filtration, surgery, advanced mathematics, and many more amazing scientific advances which quickly spread throughout Muslim countries due to the cultural exchange at Mecca. I wonder what the world could have been like if the Mongols had never…

"Muslim world" is somewhat misleading glamorizing generalization in all such statements. Pretty much all examples which are used as a proof of the MW comparatively advanced stage at early medieval times come from Iran/Persia, and Middle East. Both were very much advanced well-before Arab conquests, and simply continued to be so. There were many other parts of MW which were much below that level, or which to tge contrary experienced devastation, and decline as a result of the conquest. The Christendom was very uneven too, of course. And lots if people lived in mud huts in both realms.

Also, blaming Mongols as if they were the sole destroyers is absolutely incorrect.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#228

Post by frozenport »

deathgrips wrote: post #35
keiferski wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The destruction of Baghdad itself, including the House of Wisdom (large library), by the Mongols in 1258 is probably a more apt comparison. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Wisdom https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Baghdad_(1258)

What a tragedy. Most westerners don't realize that when Europeans were living in mud huts and emptying their chamber pots into the streets, the Muslim world had plumbing, water filtration, surgery, advanced mathematics, and many more amazing scientific advances which quickly spread throughout Muslim countries due to the cultural exchange at Mecca. I wonder what the world could have been like if the Mongols had never…

Were the Byzantines European?

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#229

Post by free_rms »

brokenkebab wrote: post #226
deathgrips wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a tragedy. Most westerners don't realize that when Europeans were living in mud huts and emptying their chamber pots into the streets, the Muslim world had plumbing, water filtration, surgery, advanced mathematics, and many more amazing scientific advances which quickly spread throughout Muslim countries due to the cultural exchange at Mecca. I wonder what the world could have been like if the Mongols had never…

"Muslim world" is somewhat misleading glamorizing generalization in all such statements. Pretty much all examples which are used as a proof of the MW comparatively advanced stage at early medieval times come from Iran/Persia, and Middle East. Both were very much advanced well-before Arab conquests, and simply continued to be so. There were many other parts of MW which were much below that level, or which to tge contr…

The arab conquests were like ~700, we're talking about hundreds of years later. I think 'the muslim world' can take some credit for developments on that timeframe.

Re: Authorities say Hobby Lobby's Gilgamesh tablet is stolen, must go back to Iraq

#230

Post by brigandish »

tomjakubowski wrote: post #199
brigandish wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that "Golden Age" includes the destruction of Nalanda[1], then forgive me if I agree with the person you're replying to, it was an incredibly destructive empire that aggressively expanded and destroyed anything that deemed heretic. As such, it's not exceptional in either sense. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nalanda#Decline_and_destructio... Edit - As I can't reply to stuff like this (it deserved to die) but in…

This thread was at one point about Arabs and the scope of the Islamic Golden Age usually does not include the Turkic people who sacked Nalanda.

Was it me who brought up the Islamic Golden Age?

No, thanks for noticing. You might try replying to the person that did bring it up and telling them to stay on topic.

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