Wednesday 10 October 2012

Using Ancient Artefacts in US Schools

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The American CPRI's Arthur Horton comments that "foreign countries" will "help people study their archaeology" by allowing the licit trade in archaeological artefacts to flourish.  He then adds:
The objects these countries allow to leave (tens of thousands of them, including coins, engraved stones, terracotta figures, lamps -- the types go on and on) are picked up by private collectors and often gifted to schools, colleges and institutions eager to have their students look at, even handle, real objects. 
I am sure, given the right teacher with access to suitable material, such handling sessions are very educational. I wonder why this has to  be a private initiative in a country such as the USA, do they have no museums that could put together travelling handling collections? I remember we had many from our local museum in my school in England.

Anyway, surely the point is that US schools would presumably rather have access to licit artefacts rather than those bought by collectors of illicit origins. In the same way I presume they teach biology using specimens (for example human bones for anatomy classes) of proven licit origins and not "fell off the back of a lorry" specimens.

Can the private collectors with their 'show and tell' presentations always guarantee that? 

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