next »

TRAILBLAZERS
for students

ArchaeoFind
Archaeology News
Articles
Browse Attachments
Calendar
Downloads
Forum
Gallery
Links
Member Map
Our News Feeds
Submit Article
Tag Cloud
Video Channel

Trailblazers
Play Phaos
Chat
Trailblazers: Virtual Tours
History's Hinge - 'Ain Jalut

[Sovereign]

The Controversial Pesto Representation of the Seuso-plate
Archaeologists alarmed at display of Roman hoard claimed by Hungary
 Maev Kennedy
Tuesday October 17, 2006
The Guardian

One of the most beautiful and infamous treasure hoards of the 20th century, 14 pieces of Roman-era silver of staggering quality, will resurface today on display in London, to the consternation of leading archaeologists who regard it as archaeological loot.

Although Bonhams auction house, which will display the Sevso Hoard, insists no sale is planned, the Marquess of Northampton who bought the silver for an undisclosed sum in the 1980s recently said he "hopes" the silver will be sold, and that it has "cursed" his family. It now belongs to a trust he founded.

 But the Hungarian government has written to Bonhams to protest at the exhibition and reiterate its claim that the silver was found on Hungarian soil and illegally exported from the country.

Lord Renfrew, retired professor of archaeology at Cambridge, an expert on illicit antiquities, said: "It looks very much as if it is being touted about again. Whether anyone can actually prove it, it is pretty sure that it was looted, and as such it ranks as tainted goods. This is very distasteful."

The Sevso Treasure, with a notional value of more than ?100m, had probably already passed through the hands of several dealers before it came to London in the early 1980s, and was bought by the marquess on the advice of the late Peter Wilson, a former deputy chairman of the auction firm Sotheby's.

It is believed by many archaeologists to have been illicitly excavated in Hungary and smuggled out of the country in the late 1970s, and to have cost the life of at least one man. It was last seen in public in 1990, when a planned Sotheby's auction was abandoned after Hungary, Yugoslavia and Lebanon all claimed but failed to prove ownership through the US courts, which found that the marquess was the legal owner.

The marquess, whose estates include more than 30,000 acres and magnificent stately homes in Oxfordshire and Warwickshire, sued his legal advisers after the Sotheby's auction was abandoned, and received a substantial but undisclosed settlement out of court.

The 14 pieces of fabulous silver include four enormous platters, the size of bin lids, each containing up to a stone of pure silver. They may have been made in a Greek workshop for a staggeringly wealthy Roman client, possibly the Sevso who gave the hoard its name in the inscription: "May these, O Sevso, yours for many ages be, small vessels fit to serve your offspring worthily."

The Hungarians believe the silver was found in the late 1970s by Jozsef Sumegh, then a 22-year-old quarryman. He was found hanged in 1980. He is believed to have first hidden the pieces, then sold them on the black market. His death was first explained as suicide, but the Hungarian authorities now believe he was murdered - possibly to extinguish the origins of the silver.

Bonhams will show the silver at private viewings in London. The glossy invitations, sent to collectors, academics and archaeologists, describe it as "the finest surviving collection of ancient silver known to exist".

A spokesman for Bonhams said: "We think it's an astonishing collection, obviously, and we're very flattered to be asked to show it. There is enormous academic interest in this silver, but it has been locked in a vault for the last 16 years. It seems better to us to put it on display than to have it locked away, and we are thrilled and privileged to be given the opportunity to do that."

Roger Bland, a former coins expert at the British Museum, head of the portable antiquities scheme for recording archaeological finds, was astounded when his invitation arrived. "It is very difficult to see what Bonhams hope to achieve through this private viewing. Under [government] guidelines for museums no UK museum could ever acquire or even borrow it. I think the circumstantial evidence points strongly to its having come from Hungary, and I hope that it goes back there and is put on show for public benefit."

The pieces resemble those found near Lake Balaton in the 19th century, now in the national museum in Budapest, and one is engraved Pelso, the Roman name for the lake.

In Budapest Eva Hajdu, responsible for the Sevso case within the ministry of culture, said negotiations with the marquess broke down some years ago.

She said the Hungarian government believes it could win a legal claim. But no such claim has yet been lodged.

"We would like to announce to Bonhams, and to the art world, that this is Hungarian property," Ms Hajdu said.

Retired detective sergeant Richard Ellis, formerly of the art and antiquities squad at Scotland Yard, who for years tried to track the provenance of the silver, said: "Am I 100% certain of what happened with it? No. Let's say that the evidence stacks up, and that there is a total lack of evidence on the other side. And from what I have seen of the evidence, I do not believe that that man committed suicide."

Backstory

The Sevso Treasure, 14 massive Roman era silver bowls, salvers and ewers, believed to date from between 350AD and 450AD, was brought to London in the early 1980s with an export licence from Lebanon, later claimed to be a forgery. The Hungarian government, backed by many experts, is convinced the hoard was found in their country in 1978 by a quarry worker, and illegally exported. The silver was bought as an investment by the Marquess of Northampton, on the advice of the late Peter Wilson, former chairman of Sotheby's. In 1990, when a Sotheby's auction was announced and the silver was on display in New York, Lebanon, Hungary and Yugoslavia all lodged legal claims to it. In 1993 the American court found that none could prove title, and that the marquess was the legal owner - but the silver, left without any agreed provenance, has been regarded as unsaleable.

[Solomon]

Bonhams' chairman says the treasure is of "spectacular beauty"
Disputed Roman treasure on show
One of the finest Roman treasures known has gone on show in London, despite a continuing row over its ownership.

The value of the 14 silver vessels, known as the Sevso Hoard and dated to about 400AD, has been put at ?50-100m.

They have been put on limited show by Bonhams auction house, and its owner, the Marquess of Northampton, wishes to sell them, according to his lawyer.

But the Hungarian government has protested, saying the hoard was found in Hungary and exported illegally.

The hoard includes intricately carved tableware - most notably a dish 70cm (27.5in) across and weighing nearly 9kg (19lb), which carries a dedication to its presumed owner, Sevso or Seuso.

Charitable foundation
Its existence was first publicly known in 1980, when it was reportedly acquired by a consortium headed by the Marquess of Northampton.

It was put up for sale in New York in 1990, but the sale was halted when the governments of Hungary, Lebanon and the then Yugoslavia all claimed it had been illegally removed from their territory.

However, claims of ownership by these countries were rejected by a US court.

Castle Ashby
Lord Northampton's lawyer says he wishes to provide for Castle Ashby

The Marquess of Northampton's lawyer, Ludovic de Walden, says the treasure remains available for sale and the proceeds would be used to maintain the 60-year-old peer's stately home, Castle Ashby in Northamptonshire.

"He would like to ensure that before he dies the treasure is sold and that the proceeds can be endowed to a charitable foundation to pay for the upkeep of Castle Ashby, which is an expensive place to run," said Mr de Walden.

The Hungarian government believes the treasure was found near Lake Balaton in the west of Hungary by a quarry worker and smuggled out of the country.

An official of the Ministry of Culture told The Guardian newspaper: "We would like to announce to Bonhams, and to the art world, that this is Hungarian property."

One report says the Hungarian quarry worker who allegedly found the treasure was later found dead, and that the complete hoard may have included some 16 pieces not in Lord Northampton's collection.

According to Bonhams chairman Robert Brooks, "The collection is of such spectacular beauty that it absolutely cannot be right for it to be locked away in perpetuity."

[Solomon]

There is no certainty on the origin of this treasure, although it is thought that it was found in Lebanon about 1970. Another, and more probable hypothesis, is that its origin was Pannoniae (Hungary), as the only geographic indication found on the treasure is the name of the lake 'Pelso', which is the Latin name of the lake Balaton that is situated in West Hungary.
The pieces, all made between the 4th and the 5th century after Christ, were packed into a large bronze pail dating to the 6th or 7th century after Christ which preserved the content from oxidation and maintained the silver in perfect condition. The most plausible hypothesis is that the treasure was buried in the 7th century, at the time of the Arabic conquests.


The treasure derives its 'Seuso' name from the Latin inscription on the central medallion of a large dish that allows us to identify the owner ('That these small containers, oh Seuso, belong to you and your descendants for many centuries and prove worthy of them' 'HEC SEUSO TIBI DURENT PER SAECULA FINES POSTERIS UT PROSENT VASCULA DIGNA TUIS').
The central medallion has a niello decoration representing hunting and the banquet of Seuso. Other hunting scenes are on the edge (the diameter is 27 3/4 in.).

The Treasure of Seuso

The treasure is constituted comprehensively of 14 silver objects and, besides the dish of Seuso, includes:
- another four dishes of differing size,
- five pitchers of varied measure with vertical handle, embossed and nielloed,
- an ewer embossed with a Dionysiac procession,
- two 'situle' (note 1) embossed with scenes of the myth of Hippolyte and Phaedre,
- A cylindrical container with conical cover embossed with scenes of a lady's toilet


Pitcher with geometrical and floral engravings, 22 in. high (a pair)


Pitcher with 120 hexagonal panels engraved and nielloed with human and animal figures and geometrical motifs (20 in. high)


Silver gilt ewer with embossing of a Dionysiac procession and handles in the shape of two panthers (15 1/4 in. high)


Situla (note 1) embossed with scenes of the myth of Hippolyte and Phaedre, 11 1/2 in. high (a pair))


Cylindrical container with conical cover embossed with scenes of a lady's toilet (12 1/2 in. high)


Dish with waves and geometrical motifs (18 in. diameter)


'Dish of Meleagro' decorated with Calidone's wild boar hunting scenes (28 in. diameter)

Endnote
(1) The Latin word 'situla' conventionally identifies a pot of conic or ovoidal shape. Its specific function was to get and to contain liquid. The pictures of some Etruscan pots and of the ceramics show its use as a bucket to get the water from the well, like container of sacred water in religious ceremonies, like a pot for libations or for collecting the blood of the victims during the sacrifices or the bacchical rites.
Typical of 2nd and 3rd century A.D. are the silver 'situla' with deep domed bowl copied by similar items made in bronze by Gallic and German populations.

[Administration]

For the last week, scores of scholars, museum curators and collectors have been discreetly filing into a well-guarded gallery of the Bonhams auction house here to admire 14 richly decorated silver objects that lay buried for 1,500 years in a forgotten corner of what was once the Roman Empire.

The excitement is palpable. Only once before ? for one brief morning in 1990 in New York ? has the so-called Sevso Treasure been displayed in public. Now the solid silver plates, ewers, basins and caskets, thought to be worth more than $187 million, are again living up to their reputation as one of the finest collections of ancient Roman silver ever found.

Dated from A.D. 350 to 450, the treasure takes its name from a dedication on a 22-pound hunting plate, which reads in Latin: ?May these, O Sevso, yours for many ages be, small vessels fit to serve your offspring worthily.?

This work and others carry intricate designs and detailed reliefs of boar and bear hunting, feasting and mythological stories, as well as delicate geometric forms.

Yet all this beauty carries a blemish.

While the works are on display at Bonhams with a view to an eventual sale, they remain tainted by uncertainty over their provenance and by an outstanding claim by Hungary that they were illegally removed from its territory. At most, then, this private exhibition ? viewing is by invitation or special request ? is intended as a first step toward the treasure?s rehabilitation.

Certainly, its owner, the Marquess of Northampton, would dearly like to sell it. By his own admission, he acquired it in the early 1980?s with this in mind. But two previous attempts to sell it ? in 1983 to the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles and in 1990 at an auction by Sotheby?s ? failed. Meanwhile, the collection has been stored in a London vault.

?I do not want my wife or my son to inherit what has become a curse,? Lord Northampton, now 60, told The Sunday Times of London. ?I doubt it will be sold overnight, but eventually I hope somebody or some institution will buy it, and it will go on permanent display so that people can enjoy and appreciate its exquisite beauty.?

Robert Brooks, the chairman of Bonhams, said he hoped this private exhibition, which ends on Friday, would at least provoke a debate. ?In particular, there is the question of what happens to objects when their early provenance is unknown,? he said in an interview. ?Do important objects get locked away forever, or are they exhibited and studied??

But while scholars have jumped at the chance to view the Sevso Treasure, the debate has so far not favored Lord Northampton or Bonhams, not least because recent claims by Italy and Greece to antiquities acquired by some American museums have heightened awareness of the international traffic in Roman and Greek treasures.

In a letter to The Times of London, Lord Renfrew, the former director of the Cambridge-based McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, said it would be unethical for any British museum to display the collection. And he added: ?It is an affront to public decency that a commercial dealer should do so ? even if many archaeologists, such as myself, will take the opportunity of going to inspect it.?

Ludovic de Walden, Lord Northampton?s legal adviser, responded in the newspaper that it was also ?offensive? of Lord Renfrew to imply that any criminal act might have been committed, either by Bonhams or by Lord Northampton.

But in an article in The Guardian this week, Lord Redesdale, secretary of an all-party parliamentary archaeology group, called for a full examination of the treasure?s origins. ?While the treasure remains here with its status unresolved, it represents a standing challenge to the effectiveness of the measures in force in this country to combat the trade in illicit antiquities,? he wrote.

That said, nothing certain is known about the collection before 1980, when its first six pieces were reportedly sold by a Lebanese-born art dealer called Halim Korban to Peter Wilson, a former chairman of Sotheby?s. Two years later, Mr. Wilson and a London lawyer, Peter Mimpriss, persuaded Lord Northampton to invest in the venture, and four more works were acquired.

In 1983, these 10 were offered to the Getty museum, but the museum lost interest after Lebanese export licenses were proved to be falsified. That same year Mr. Wilson died, but through Mr. Mimpriss?s connections, Lord Northampton later bought four more pieces. The collection of 14, by then owned entirely by Lord Northampton, was exhibited in New York in 1990 in anticipation of a Sotheby?s auction planned for later that year in Switzerland.

[Bart]

For sale but not for sale. The owner wants to sell, he needs a hundred million or so to keep up the mansion. The middle man wishes to distance himself from the odious air that lingers about the items yet is excited about their eventual sale, and those who come to gape with awe hold their noses. You couldn't pay me enough to be this guy's solicitor, the last one got sued for fifteen million. Lovely scene, I wish I was a playright.

What law prevents these items from exchanging hands privately within the UK? None would be my guess. Forty years from now, more or less, current thinking will have moved on and many may well kick themselves for not hearing the knock of opportunity.

THE EMPORER HAS NO CLOTHES!

- Bart

[Solomon]

I know the owner, Bart.

Marquess of Northampton

Castle Ashby House - Northamptonshire
Been to a few parties there, as a child. Had some adventures in the grounds in more recent times...
You will see my reference to him in the Oak Island thread.


The Most Hon. the Marquess of Northampton, DL
Who's Who at The United Grand Lodge of England
The Most Hon the Marquess of Northampton, DL
Pro Grand Master

Spencer Douglas David Compton, 7th Marquess of Northampton. Born 1946. Educated Eton. Landowner. Deputy Lieutenant, Northamptonshire. Previously held office in the United Grand Lodge of England as Deputy Grand Director of Ceremonies 1983-85; Grand Sword Bearer 1992; Senior Grand Warden 1994-95; Assistant Grand Master 1995-2001. Installed as Pro Grand Master March 2001.

Spencer Compton, 7th Marquess of Northampton
Spencer "Spenny" Douglas David Compton (born 2 April 1946) is the 7th and current Marquess of Northampton.

He is the son of William Compton, 6th Marquess of Northampton and Virginia Lucie Heaton.

He is said to be Britain's wealthiest Buddhist, and was ranked 701st in the Sunday Times Rich List 2006, with an estimated wealth of ?70m. He is also the current Pro Grand Master of the United Grand Lodge of England.

In November 1993, the State Supreme Court in New York confirmed his claim to the ownership of the Sevso Treasure, a hoard of late Roman Empire silver.

[edit] Marriages and issue

He married, firstly, Henriette Bentinck in 1967 and they were divorced in 1973. They had two children:

    * Lady Lara Katrina Compton (b. 26 April 1968)
    * Daniel Bingham Compton, Earl Compton (b. 16 January 1973)

He married, secondly, Annette Smallwood in 1974 and they were divorced in 1977. They had one child:

    * Lady Emily Rose Compton (b. 1980)

He married, thirdly, Rosemary Ashley Morritt Hancock in 1977 and they were divorced in 1983.

He married, fourthly, Ellen Erhardt on 12 January 1985 and they were divorced in 1988. They had one child:

    * Lady Louisa Cecilia Compton (b. 1985)

He married, fifthly, Pamela Martina Raphaela Haworth in 1990.

The Final Countdown
Apart from members of the American based Christian identity movement, whose members recently attempted to lay a ceremonial corner stone at the Temple; would you believe that some of Sharon's most important allies come from within the British aristocracy and European nobility?

That's right. Foremost amongst them is the Queens first cousin, the Duke of Kent, who heads the Quatuor Coronati 'research' lodge of the Grand Mother Lodge of British Freemasonry. The Lodge has an ongoing operation on Temple Mount itself, run on a day-to-day basis by the Seventh Marquis of Northampton, Spencer Douglas David Compton. Admittedly it may seem a little odd that British aristocrats are involved in the goings on at Temple Mount but take note, it gets even stranger. Because the Duke of Kent and Lord Northampton are both adherents of British Israelism: a doctrine that holds that the cream of British aristocracy is descended from one of the lost Tribes of Israel.

According to Lord Northampton: 'I think the tradition of the Kabbalah is very strong in England, because I think one of the lost tribes came to England. And I think you can spot them, quite clearly, in old English families. I am sure you can. I know they came to Ireland, then to the North of Wales, and then down into England. And then became some of the oldest families we have.' In Lord Northamptons view America was also colonised by another of the lost Tribes. 'That was all predicted, that one would go to Hyperborea, the land of the north, and one would go across the sea.' He told an interviewer: . . 'so I think that America and England got the Two Lost Tribes, and that is why they then, in a very intellectual Jewish way, started to run the world!'

It gets even stranger because Lord Northampton is, by his own admission, a practitioner of the Golden Dawn rituals of occultist Aleister Crowley.

Lord Northampton's right hand man on the Temple Mount project is Giuliano de Bernardo, Grand Master of Italian Regular Freemasonry. In addition to which the notorious Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith director Abe Foxman is also said to be in close collaboration because, according to Di Bernardo: 'There are strong relations between B'nai B'rith and Freemasonry.'


Are the freemasons plotting to rebuild the Temple
Although false accusations and attacks on Freemasonry are, in the main, based on the imaginative writings of nineteenth century authors, the events of the twentieth century have provided fertile ground for new attacks. Dating from at least the early 1980s, one attack by Lyndon LaRouche is an accusation that British Freemasonry, under the control of the House of Windsor, is secretly plotting to gain control of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem and build the third Temple. Like most attacks on Freemasonry, it can easily be debunked by identifying the errors in fact and logic.
The idea that freemasons of the world should unite to rebuild the Temple, or that they intended to do so, seems to have first appeared in early twentieth century Boston, or so it is reported in The Illustrated London News.

Jury Says Sevso Silver Belongs to English Lord
Published: November 5, 1993

An English marquess may keep the 1,400-year-old trove of silver artifacts that two nations had tried to wrest from him, a Manhattan jury said yesterday. The jurors, in State Supreme Court, said Hungary and Croatia had failed to prove that the silver, known as the Sevso Hoard, had been unearthed in either of those countries and spirited abroad by Spencer Douglas David Compton, the Seventh Marquess of Northampton.

The collection, believed to have belonged to a Roman military commander named Sevso, consists of 14 engraved and ornamented silver plates, vases, ewers, basins and buckets. They were said to have been found in perfect condition in a copper-alloy cauldron in the 1970's.

When Lord Northampton first put the pieces up for sale through Sotheby's almost four years ago, news reports said the silver had been found in Lebanon. Lebanon sued to get the collection, but then abruptly withdrew from the case.

That left Lord Northampton, Hungary and Croatia fighting over the collection.

Lawyers for the two Eastern European countries said they would recommend that their clients appeal. The collection would remain in the custody of the court pending any appeal.

Court Rules That Silver May Go Back to Owner
Published: April 22, 1994

The Appellate Division of State Supreme Court upheld a Manhattan jury in ruling yesterday that Hungary's and Croatia's claims to ownership of the trove of silver artifacts known as the Sevso Hoard were "without merit" and that the silver may be returned to its owner, Lord Northampton, an English marquess.

The decision affirms the verdict by a State Supreme Court jury in November that the two Governments had failed to prove the 1,400-year-old silver had been unearthed in either of those countries and taken abroad by Spencer Douglas David Compton, the Seventh Marquess of Northampton.

The collection, consisting of 14 engraved and ornamented silver plates, vases, ewers, basins and buckets, was said to have been found in perfect condition in Lebanon in the 1970's. Lebanon, which also sued to get the collection, later withdrew its claim.

I'm not taking sides here, but it does seem to me that there are two sides to this.

Solomon

[Bart]

Strange case indeed.  He has a nice home, I would want to keep it up well also. Fortunate are you to have visited there.

- Bart

[Administration]

Detail of fish and ducks from amphorae in the Sevso hoard

Five bowls, 37 cups and 187 spoons were offered with the 14 pieces which make up the Roman treasure
By Cristina Ruiz |  Posted 01 March 2007

he Sevso treasure, the most spectacular hoard of Roman silver ever discovered, may be incomplete. Documents seen by The Art Newspaper reveal that ?187 silvergilt spoons, 37 silvergilt drinking cups, and 5 silver bowls? were available for sale along with the 14 known pieces of Sevso silver in the 1980s. These additional objects have never been seen publicly and their existence has hitherto been unknown.

We have also confirmed that in 1988, five years after the Getty Museum turned down ten known objects from the Sevso hoard over concerns about the Lebanese export licences accompanying the silver, the museum was privately shown another silver plate by two US dealers. Known as the ?Chi-rho? plate because of an engraving of the first two letters of Christ?s name in Greek, it was described by the dealers as part of the Sevso hoard. The museum did not buy it.

These revelations come as the Marquess of Northampton has declared his intention to sell the 14 pieces of fourth and fifth-century AD silver he acquired in the 1980s which comprise the known Sevso hoard. These were shown privately at Bonhams in London last October after 16 years in storage.

The proposed sale has angered archaeologists since Hungary has long argued that the Sevso hoard was discovered in the Lake Balaton area and was illegally exported.

Lord Northampton?s previous attempt to sell the silver through Sotheby?s in 1990 resulted in the hoard being impounded in New York as Hungary, Yugoslavia and Lebanon filed suits arguing that the treasure had been discovered in their territory and illicitly exported. Lebanon dropped its claim before the case came to trial largely because the Lebanese export licences which accompanied the silver had been found to be fake. In November 1993, after years of litigation, the New York Supreme Court ruled that Hungary and Yugoslavia had failed to produce sufficient evidence and dismissed their claims. No legal challenge to the Marquess?s title has been made since.

The Marquess of Northampton later sued his former London legal advisors, Allen & Overy, for damages in relation to advice given during the purchase of the silver. The claim was settled by payment of an undisclosed sum believed to be around ?25m.

But the question of where the silver had been discovered and under what circumstances remain unresolved, making the story of the Sevso hoard one of the longest running mysteries in the art world.

Disclosure?
An Early Day Motion on the Sevso treasure has been tabled in Parliament by the Conservative MP Tim Loughton and signed by 48 MPs. This calls for ?the Trustee of the Marquess of Northampton 1987 Settlement and the government of the Republic of Hungary to refer all available evidence on the origin, provenance and recent movement of the silver to an independent expert evaluation charged with identifying on the balance of probabilities the country of origin of the silver.? It also calls for the Sevso hoard not to be sold until this independent assessment has taken place.

Writing in this newspaper, Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn, reiterates the call for an independent investigation and calls for the publication of any evidence disclosed to it.

Time for the Sevso evidence to be made public
By Colin Renfrew, Professor Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn, Fellow of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge University.

 The Sevso story gets murkier and murkier. For the archaeologist and, indeed, for the general public the scandal of clandestine and presumably illegal excavation is, above all, the loss of information. We learn about the human past when artefacts like the late Roman silver vessels of the Sevso Treasure are found from the context of their discovery. We need to know exactly how a find was made, in what context, and with what other materials. And above all we need to know where it was found?a workshop, a rich burial, a Roman villa?

This document to Guernroy Ltd reveals the antiquities trade at its most ugly and shameful. It suggests what many have long suspected: that the 14 splendid silver vessels which are currently in the possession of the Marquess of Northampton are only a part of a larger hoard, which was split up by dealers more concerned with gain than historical information following its discovery. The tragedy of Sevso is not only that the treasure was removed from its country of origin and the circumstances of its discovery lost, but that this important find may have been split up.

The second document, to the aptly-named Mr Risk in the Lebanon, would be comic if the Sevso story were not such a tragedy to archaeology. The trustees are revealed as paying $500,000 for ?legal export licences? for those 14 silver vessels, licences which would document that they had been exported from the Lebanon. But export licences are usually issued prior to the export taking place! On what evidence would these ?legal export licences? be issued? The public at large are entitled to ask those serving as trustees then what grounds they had for supposing that the 14 silver vessels had ever been in the Lebanon. The trail in this murky affair seems instead to lead back to Vienna. Members of the All-Party Parliamentary Archaeology Group heard last year in Westminster about the evidence which Hungarian archaeologists claim establishes the findspot as near Lake Balaton in Hungary. Hungary?s claim, which was dismissed by a New York court in 1993, raises many unanswered questions about the Sevso silver.

Is it not time that there was a public inquiry into the Sevso Affair? Lord Northampton in 1991 received an out-of-court settlement of an undisclosed sum, believe to be around ?25m, from Peter Mimpriss, his former lawyer and his law firm Allen & Overy, for mishandling his affairs. The writ of summons alleged ?fraud, deceit, negligence and fraudulent misrepresentation? among other claims. Presumably these troubling documents, now made public for the first time by The Art Newspaper, were already revealed in the papers submitted to the court at that time, but all the materials then submitted remain confidential under the terms of the settlement. The Early Day Motion set down by Tim Loughton, MP, calls for an expert and independent evaluation of all the evidence relating to the Sevso Treasure. I would go one step further and ask for the publication and public evaluation of that evidence. It is time now for some transparency in an effort to establish the treasure?s place of discovery.

Meanwhile, what of the ?187 silvergilt spoons, 37 silvergilt drinking cups and five silver bowls? which the documents say were ?guaranteed? by Halim Korban as ?future purchases? by or on behalf of Lord Northampton? Are they part of the Sevso treasure? Lord Northampton says he did not buy them. So what did happen to them? These are matters of public concern within the UK because the 14 vessels which Lord Northampton holds are currently located in the UK. Indeed they formed the basis for that curious exhibition, held last year in Bond Street at Bonhams the auctioneers, to which the general public was not admitted, when they were seen for the first time by archaeologists in this country.

The Sevso Treasure is one of the important discoveries of the past 30 years and deserves to be exhibited in the national museum of its country of origin. These squalid documents go some way to explaining why that is not yet the case.

[Bart]

A Google on Halim korban turned up quite a few sordid tales of the antiquity/collector (under)'world', and his alleged involvement in Sevso.  What a cesspool.

http://www.michelvanrijn.nl/UK_7_002_20.htm
http://www.michelvanrijn.nl/artnews/constatine.htm
http://www.theartnewspaper.com/article01.asp?id=581
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2001/11/landesman.htm
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/10/26/features/sevso.php

- Bart

[Solomon]

Reading this story, I find it impossible to forget that the character at the centre is the head of freemasony. I imagine that the principals of his law firm as also masons. Further, that the person within the insurance company that covers the law firm for liability is also a mason.

That's the way it works, as I see it.

In that case, the mason at the insurance company pays ?25 million to the mason in the law firm, who then pays ?25 million to the marquis. For what? Because the marquis is unhappy.

Nice work, if you can get it.

Meanwhile, the marquis holds the silverware for a few years, then resells it for a massive profit.

I may be wrong, but in my judgment, it is going to be very difficult to make justice work in this case.

In the England I know, connections mean power and the marquis has loads of both, in all the right places.

Archaeology and history are respected areas of study, but I do not see their exponents as having sufficient clout in this case. People will tut tut and move along.

Solomon