this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2024
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[–] merc@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

On one hand, sure, the British took a lot of things from other places when their empire spanned the globe. And, it sucks for places that had their stuff taken that it is no longer where it was.

On the other hand the British Museum is probably one of the safest places in the world for these things. The museum cares about preservation, knows how to do it, and has the funds to do it. And, while there's undoubtedly corruption in the UK, there's a very low chance that any of these things is going to disappear out of the museum and into some powerful person's private collection.

Mohamed Salah is standing in front of a statue from Egypt, which was taken from Egypt to London. But, the British didn't manage to take the Buddhas of Bamiyan from Afghanistan to London, and what happened? The Taliban blew them up. The British also didn't fully loot Iraq when they controlled that territory, which meant that in the 2003 war the museum was looted but not by people who wanted treasures for a public museum. The poorer and less politically stable a country is, the greater the chances that their cultural treasures will be stolen or destroyed.

Despite the repression and corruption, Egypt is now probably stable enough that if any of these items were returned to Egypt, they would probably be well treated and put on display for Egyptians to see. The power of the military in Egypt and the level of corruption probably means a few small items would disappear from the museum, but the most important items would make it. But, is Egypt stable enough that the museum would be safe for another 20, 40, 80 years? I have my doubts. I do think London is probably safe for that long.

Maybe it's just me, but I think the number one priority should be preserving these things for the future. Displaying them for the public should be a lower priority. If there are items like scrolls or clothing that are too delicate to even display behind a glass case, they should be stored away. I know that's how they handle things at the Smithsonian, and I assume the British Museum is the same. Because of that, my bias is that the most important cultural items should be in the care of the richest museums in the world, even if it means that they're not in the places they came from.

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 2 points 46 minutes ago

Yes. Preservation that's why it was taken. You see that statue was in imminent danger of being left there for the local people to preserve. The horror!

My favorite story about the British stealing shit is that time they stole a cultures entire written history. They had it all written on tablets and arranged in a specific order. It never occurred to them though that they should put page numbers because who would jumble them up? Who would destroy their history like that? Ah yes, the British, that's who.

But that's all in the past, and now it's the only place on earth that can preserve these things. The only place. There is no other place. No possible other home for these artifacts.

[–] JustAnOrdinaryCreep@lemmy.ml 9 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago) (3 children)

Would be funny only if Mohammad Salah was aware that Egypt wasn't always inhabited by Arabs, but by lots of different people and ethnicities. Arab Muslims just conquered and colonized Egypt, they just colonize differently than Europeans.

[–] Birbatron@slrpnk.net 3 points 33 minutes ago

As an Egyptian the sheer ignorance of this comment is absolutely stunning.

It's impressive

[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 4 points 3 hours ago (2 children)

Is there a time period I could research for when Arab Muslims conquered Egypt?

[–] VindictiveJudge@lemmy.world 5 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_conquest_of_Egypt

It was pretty quick, just 639 to 642. The western half of the Roman Empire had already collapsed and the eastern half wasn't doing much better.

[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 hours ago

Thank you for the reference!

[–] RedAggroBest@lemmy.world 4 points 2 hours ago (2 children)

Iirc it was the Abbasid Caliphate that was the first Muslims to take over Egypt. The 1000 years prior or so, it'd been Roman territory (Byzantine after the fall of Western Rome, but same difference)

[–] Birbatron@slrpnk.net 1 points 9 minutes ago

It was conquered by the Rashidun Caliphate some 1400 years ago, It had been a Roman Province for I believe just under 700 years.

Egypt's first major power since the Hellenic Lagid (Ptolemaic) Dynasty was the Later Fatimid Caliphate (The Earlier one was in Tunisia). The Fatimids were a highly underrated (both by westerners, because they aren't ancient, and by us Egyptians, because they followed a different sect of Islam which most consider heretical) golden age for Egypt, they established Cairo, and along with it one of the oldest operating universities on Earth, and were probably the most tolerant state of their time, they were Shia Muslims ruling over a majority Sunni and Christian Population, but Unlike the Safavids in Persia (who forcefully converted a major portion of their population to Shiism and were much more radical than the Fatimids). The cultural renaissance that occured during their period caused accelerated arabization in Egypt as more and more people started to speak Arabic since that was the language of the new cultural powerhouse of the region.

We do not talk about al Hakim.

[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 hours ago

Thank you for the reference!

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

The Muslims conquered land and replaced its government, they did not murder and replace their entire population. This is why countries like Somalia are filled with black people who are Muslims and not Arabs.

Mohamed Salah has Egyptian ancestry. He is not a random Arab Muslim claiming that Egypt was Arab.

Settler colonization and replacing everything with 'superior white people' is a rather modern European tradion

[–] JustAnOrdinaryCreep@lemmy.ml 5 points 2 hours ago (2 children)

To colonise doesn't mean to murder and entirely replace an ENTIRE population.

But keep on putting everything except European conquest and colonisation into perspective, you're good at it.

[–] Birbatron@slrpnk.net 1 points 23 minutes ago

There's a difference between colonialism and conquest. Conquest was much much more common in the past than colonialism. Before modern European colonialism, the only people who had made colonial efforts had been the Greeks (with small city colonies in places like Libya, for example), and the Norse, with their colonization of Greenland and their attempt to colonize what is today Newfoundland. Otherwise, the rest was conquest. There's a significant difference between the two.

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 1 points 23 minutes ago* (last edited 23 minutes ago)

There are multiple forms of colonialism. The term settler colonialism' is relatively new.

Settler colonialism is a logic and structure of displacement by settlers, using colonial rule, over an environment for replacing it and its indigenous peoples with settlements and the society of the settlers.

Practically every example you will find is Europeans getting on a boat and killing natives. The most famous example is Manifest Destiny also known as America.

[–] mtpender@lemmy.world 5 points 4 hours ago

Highlander detected

[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.ml 7 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago) (3 children)

Isn't the idea of museums that you can learn about other cultures without going there?

[–] Fenrisulfir@lemmy.ca 17 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Except the British museum where you do have to go there to experience their culture of theivery

[–] NatakuNox@lemmy.world 2 points 1 hour ago

Yup. It's not like they asked to have other people's stuff in their museums. They killed and conquered, then took anything that wasn't nailed down.

[–] nepenthes@lemmy.world 4 points 4 hours ago

If it's on-loan, sure.

But this was straight up thievery.

[–] pyre@lemmy.world 2 points 4 hours ago

holy shit I should totally call my apartment a museum so I can steal anything I want

[–] drunkpostdisaster@lemmy.world 1 points 3 hours ago (3 children)

Does Europe have any culture that isn't stolen or brutality forced on others?

[–] JasonDJ@lemmy.zip 9 points 2 hours ago

Greece is in Europe.

So is Rome, but that's a terrible example after mentioning Greece.

[–] Flipper 8 points 3 hours ago

Europe, yes. Britain, doubtful.

[–] thawed_caveman@lemmy.world 2 points 2 hours ago

Pre-christian pagan cultures (Celts, Goths etc), but neo-nazis are also fans of those so you get to share with them.

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