International
Colombia’s crusade to repatriate its archeological heritage
November 5 |
Wearing latex gloves and a white coat, restorer Carla Medina holds part of Colombia’s history in her hands. A growing number of pre-Columbian pieces are returning from abroad in an unorthodox way: President Gustavo Petro himself is bringing them back.
“It’s a great responsibility and a great privilege,” he tells AFP in his laboratory at the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History (ICANH).
Medina, 41, analyzes a clay vessel repatriated from Italy, which had to be reconstructed from fragments. She is grateful “to have the opportunity to have access to an object that has so many years of history”.
At least 560 pre-Columbian pieces were returned from other countries aboard the presidential plane of leftist Gustavo Petro, in some of the more than 30 trips abroad that he has completed in just over a year in office. International tours criticized by the opposition as dispensable and costly.
Most of the pieces returned from the United States, United Kingdom, Belgium, Spain, Germany, Mexico, among other countries, in a coordinated work between the Foreign Ministry and ICANH.
One of the most recent returns was in October and took place on the diplomatic vessel Gloria, where 12 archeological pieces traveled from Costa Rica to Cartagena.
The recovery is part of a strategy of “efficient use of resources”, said at the time the former vice-minister of Multilateral Affairs, Laura Gil, and is advancing at an accelerated pace compared to the previous government, in which only 18 pieces were repatriated in four years.
For Catalina Ceballos, director of cultural affairs at the Foreign Ministry, it is a way to “start talking about decolonization from another perspective.”
Most of the pieces returned to Colombia were taken out of the country when there was no legal clarity in the world on the traffic of archaeological goods.
Only since 1997 has Colombian law recognized the State as the legitimate owner of national archaeological heritage.
However, the fight against illegal trafficking of these pieces has not been a priority in a country bled by half a century of armed conflict between authorities, guerrillas, paramilitaries and criminal gangs. While the budget suggested by the Presidency for ICANH in 2024 is equivalent to some 2.3 million dollars, that proposed for the defense area and the Police is almost 600 times greater.
Juan Pablo Ospina, coordinator of the anthropology group at ICANH, nevertheless emphasizes that in the current government repatriations have been “successful” because the presidential plane has been “fully available” to bring pieces “properly packed and safeguarded on those trips”.
Recent returns have been made mostly by private collectors on a voluntary basis and require diplomatic work in each country of origin. ICANH is then in charge of the registration, cataloguing, transfer, reception and, in some cases, intervention of the pieces.
As most of the repatriated works are ceramic, the restoration processes are simpler. “Even though they are very old, they can be very well preserved with the passage of time,” says Medina.
The most vulnerable materials are those “of an organic nature,” such as textiles, paper or wood.
The composition of the materials also offers details about how Colombia’s early societies functioned in relation to their territory, says Medina.
For the most part, the Colombian territory was made up of pre-Columbian societies distributed in small chiefdoms.
Ospina assures that what today corresponds to Panama, Venezuela, Colombia and part of northern Ecuador is known as the “intermediate zone” in Latin American archeology, “because what happened there is completely different from what happened in Mesoamerica or in the central Andes,” where great empires were formed.
That is why in Colombia, unlike in Mexico or Peru, it is not common to find palaces, pyramids or large goldsmith traces, with one great exception: the treasure of the Quimbayas. A collection of gold found at the end of the 19th century in a small village in the department of Quindío (west), donated at that time to the Queen of Spain by the Colombian president Carlos Holguín and which today is in the Museum of America in Madrid.
Most of Colombia’s archaeological treasures are ceramic pieces from different periods and cultures, some 6,000 and 7,000 years old, found in the Caribbean, Ospina explains.
“They are very early evidence of ceramics,” he adds.
In other Colombian regions the use of ceramics dates back to approximately 1,000 BC, present mainly in religious and funerary rites.
International
President Boric announces curfew following triple police homicide in Chile
International
President López Obrador meets with Astros and Rockies ahead of Mexico City Series
International
Social media star Om Fahad fatally shot in Baghdad
President Boric announces curfew following triple police homicide in Chile
President López Obrador meets with Astros and Rockies ahead of Mexico City Series
Social media star Om Fahad fatally shot in Baghdad
Tec de Monterrey honors one of its students for his contribution to nanotechnology in medicine
Defense Minister commends salvadoran soldier for Central American Cross Country victory
Ecuador prison riot leaves at least 43 dead
-
International8 hours agoSocial media star Om Fahad fatally shot in Baghdad
-
International4 days agoThe U.S. Senate approves a military aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan
-
International8 hours agoPresident Boric announces curfew following triple police homicide in Chile
-
International8 hours agoDonald Trump agrees to Joe Biden’s debate challenge, proposes White House Venue
-
International4 days agoA plane with two people on board crashes in Alaska
-
International8 hours agoU.S. Intelligence reports Putin likely didn’t order Navalny’s killing
-
International4 days agoBiden believes that Florida voters will vote in favor of protecting access to abortion
-
International8 hours agoPresident López Obrador meets with Astros and Rockies ahead of Mexico City Series
-
Internacionales2 days agoThe indigenous people demand from Lula more speed for the demarcation of their lands
-
International4 days ago
A U.S. media manager says he favored Trump to help him in his 2016 campaign
-
International4 days agoThe Court urges the judge to continue proceeding in the case of Obiang’s son
-
International4 days agoThe Colombian Senate approves the pension reform of the Petro Government
-
International4 days agoArgentine society defends its sensitive fiber before the Government: public education
-
International2 days agoTurkey’s president calls Netanyahu the “butcher of Gaza”
-
International2 days agoThe US sanctions 16 companies and 8 people linked to the Iranian drone program
-
International2 days agoRussia prepared a strategy to support the German far-right, according to Der Spiegel
-
International2 days agoThe US unblocks $6 billion in aid to Ukraine for Patriot missiles and drones
-
International2 days agoKey witness involves Trump in efforts not to be harmed in the elections
-
International2 days agoA court orders the arrest of the Ukrainian Minister of Agriculture accused of corruption
-
International2 days agoThe Supreme Court is skeptical of Trump’s immunity but could lengthen the litigation
-
International2 days agoIsraeli bombings in the north and south of Gaza cause fifty deaths
-
International2 days agoAznar and Quiroga defend Israel’s “peace” and “surness” in a world congress in Argentina
-
International4 days agoThe Prosecutor’s Office asks to prevent Peru’s departure from the suspended attorney general Patricia Benavides
-
International2 days agoBlinken asks China not to “help” Russia with the supply of Defense components
-
International2 days agoJosé Andrés demands from the pulpit an independent investigation of the Israeli attack
-
International2 days agoThe Chinese president tells the United States that he has to be “faithful” to his word to solve the “problems to be solved”
-
International2 days agoJosé Mujica maintains that Milei is “very impulsive” and does not doubt that Brazil “will be a power”
-
International2 days ago“War is war,” Petro tells the Central General Staff after the death of 15 dissidents
-
International4 days agoAmnesty International warns that the world is on the verge of the collapse of international law
-
International2 days agoThe UN denounces widespread arrests of young Iranians in the new campaign to impose the veil
-
International4 days agoThe United States will compensate the victims of former doctor Larry Nassar with 138.7 million dollars
-
International4 days agoNoboa proclaims victory in the referendum and assures that Ecuador said “‘Yes’ to the future”
-
International4 days agoMaduro invites to return to the UN office for human rights, expelled from Venezuela in February