A bronze statue of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, until now part of the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art (USA), will finally be returned to Turkey after a long legal and scientific dispute in which the Turkish authorities were able to prove that the statue was stolen from excavations in the Turkish province of Burdur and subsequently taken out of the country illegally.
According to a recent report in the New York Times, the statue, which was built between the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD, was taken out of Turkey without authorisation during excavations carried out illegally in the 1960s in the ruins of Bubon, an ancient city of Lycia located nowdays in the province of Burdur. The statue was part of a group of sculptures that decorated an ancient Sebasteion, or sanctuary, dedicated to the rulers of the Roman Empire.
After changing hands numerous times, the Cleveland Museum of Art (Ohio, USA) acquired it in 1986, exhibiting it as part of its collection of archaeological objects from the Roman period. Finally, and after initial research revealed its true origin, the Turkish authorities initiated a process to reclaim the sculpture from the Cleveland Museum: archives, academic studies and archaeological work clearly determined the origin of the statue.
Although the Cleveland Museum of Art ultimately tried to block the return of the statue, arguing that it had not been sufficiently proven that the effigy belonged to the aforementioned place and that it had been stolen, an exhaustive additional investigation that included ‘extensive witness interviews and forensic evidence’ demonstrated beyond doubt that ‘this antique was stolen from the Boubon district’ and subsequently sent to the United States, where it was sold in New York by art dealers, according to Alvin L. Bragg, district attorney in Manhattan.
With this evidence, the Manhattan district attorney determined that the claim made by Turkey was justified, and on 14 February ordered the museum to return the stolen effigy. Considered one of the best-preserved bronze sculptures of ancient times, the statue is notable for showing an image of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius as a philosopher, although its head is missing. The statue is scheduled to return from the US to Turkey at the end of this year.
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Edited and reviewed by:
Pablo Gómez is a specialist in Turkey and has been editor-in-chief of Hispanatolia since 2011. He has been analysing current affairs and geopolitics in Turkey and the surrounding region since 2006.
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