Artifacts looted from Baghdad museums irreplaceable, magnitude of loss incomprehensible

By Amber Bennett
Department of Sociology and Anthropology

I have been asked several times in recent days about the magnitude of the loss of artifacts and documents from Baghdad's National Museum and Library. The artifact and documents, I reply, are irreplaceable. Those artifacts - carved stone, fired clay, worked metal - and those documents - books, letters, deeds - are not simply reflections of or images of the past. They are the past.

The objects looted from Iraq's cultural warehouses, when studied and understood within the context of the other objects around them, had the ability to convey information about the people and communities that made and used them. Removed from that context, they have no worth beyond the price they can fetch on Ebay.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld noted on April 15 that the loss of the materials was "unfortunate," but dismissed the looting as something that "happens in a war zone." He went on to optimistically predict that many of the items would be found and returned to the appropriate authorities. He added that he suspected many of the items had in fact been hidden before the conflict began. He neglected to report that several prominent groups, including UNESCO and the American Council for Cultural Policy, months before the war began, had explicitly sought the aid of the American government, particularly the Department of Defense, in protecting Iraq's cultural resources.

So, what has been lost? The earliest evidence of writing, artifacts created by the world's first farmers, some of the earliest examples of formal laws, and some of the world's most beautiful works of art.

A few of these objects may ultimately be recovered and the chances of their recovery is far greater if collectors and dealers in the United States and Europe refuse to purchase them. Even so, Iraq has lost its artifactual and documentary heritage, and all of us have lost our history, our sense of ourselves and our origins.

The magnitude of what has been lost is incomprehensible. We've lost the earliest vestiges of our humanity, a humanity abandoned in the crisis of war and poverty.