Reuters North American News Service, October 27th, 2007
PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Princeton University said
Friday it has reached agreement with the Italian government
to return eight works of art whose ownership has been in
dispute.
The artworks are among 15 antiquities in the collection of
the university museum that have been subject to discussions
between the New Jersey college and Italy's Ministry of Cultural
Properties and Activities, Princeton said in a statement.
Princeton will transfer title to the eight objects but keep
four of them on loan for four years. The works that will remain
on loan include a Greek psykter and an Apulian loutrophoros --
both types of vases -- that, along with an Etruscan relief,
were the subject of an Italian inquiry in 2004. The college
will keep the other seven.
Italy also agreed to lend Princeton an unspecified number
of works of art of "great significance and cultural
importance," and to give its students "unprecedented access" to
archeological sites managed by the Italian ministry.
The agreement represents the latest chapter in the Italian
government's long-running efforts to recover antiquities that
it claims have been illegally removed from the country, often
by wealthy Americans, and which represent an essential part of
its culture.
In February this year, New York's Metropolitan Museum of
Art returned 21 of its antiquities to Italy after a
long-running dispute.
In September, Yale University said it would return to Peru
thousands of artifacts removed by Hiram Bingham, the
Yale-backed explorer who discovered Peru's mountain citadel of
Machu Picchu in 1911.
The objects in the latest agreement include a Roman dagger,
an Etruscan plaque and a Greek plate, and range in age from
about 675 B.C. to the second century A.D.
"Some of the works being lent to us have never been outside
Italy, but now will be available to Princeton students and
scholars," said Princeton art museum director Susan Taylor.
In 2002, the university voluntarily returned to the Italian
government a Roman sculpture after finding it had been taken
out of Italy without a legal export permit before being
acquired by the museum.
Taylor said the pact marks a "new era" in relations between
the museum and Italy, in which Princeton can advance its
scholarship through improved access to Italy's cultural
treasures.
The two sides will sign an agreement on Oct. 30.
