Ulua River vessel (detail) depicting dancers, AD 750-850, Yuscaran, El Paraisso Department, Honduras. Pottery, clay slip, paint. Formerly in the collection of Marco Aurelio Soto, former president of Honduras: MAI purchase, 1917 (6/1259).
SINCE THE 1980S, THE U.S. ALSO HAS SIGNED BILATERAL AGREEMENTS WITH EL SALVADOR,
GUATEMALA, HONDURAS, NICARAGUA AND OTHER COUNTRIES TO PROTECT ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITES, PREVENT LOOTING AND RECOVER ILLEGALLY EXPORTED OBJECTS.
and 1970s, Americans working in Panama conducted amateur archaeological digs. Their finds of gold and ceramics fed art-market demand, encouraging further looting and de- struction of archaeological information that can never be recovered.
PROTECTING PATRIMONY The response to this damage has evolved in re- cent decades. Museums with Central Ameri- can collections are often accused of robbing nations of their cultural patrimony. But in the days before antiquities protection laws, Central American scholars, politicians and citizens intentionally placed archaeological collections in foreign museums. Entire private collections were sometimes sold to U.S. muse- ums to maintain their integrity. For instance,
Dr. Jorge Lines, an historian and anthropolo- gist at Costa Rica’s National University, dedi- cated himself to advancing understanding of indigenous Costa Rican cultures and provided items to MAI. More recently, concern over illegal antiq-
uities trafficking led to the United Nations’ UNESCO 1970 Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property. The Convention identified archaeo- logical objects and sites as national patrimony that deserved protection against theft and destruction. Since the 1980s, the U.S. also has signed bilateral agreements with El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and other countries to protect archaeological sites, pre- vent looting and recover illegally exported ob-
Drilled pendants like this were worn horizontally on the chest and may have been combined with other elements to make complex necklaces. Greater Nicoya snake pendant, 300 BC-AD 500, jadeite. Costa Rica Nicoya, Guanacaste Province. Gift of Arthur M. Sackler, 1966. (23/7284)
jects. Despite these steps, trade in antiquities, looting and destruction of archaeological sites continues. Beyond protection of the physical objects,
Central American people are now reclaiming the interpretation of their own past. Early studies of Central America’s past were almost exclusively the work of North Americans or other foreigners. But today, Central America’s own archaeologists, curators and other schol- ars – including indigenous people – are as- suming authority over their culture, history and associated collections. Their aim is to pre- serve and interpret Central American national and cultural heritage for the benefit of their own people. The Ceramica de los Ancestros exhibit, a joint
effort of the Museum and the Smithsonian La- tino Center, is a trail-breaking effort to help tell these stories.X – Ann McMullen and Alex Benitez.
Ann McMullen is head of the Collections Research and Documentation Department at the National Museum of the American Indian – Smithsonian. She and Prof. Benitez of George Mason University are co-curators of Ceramica de los Ancestros.
24 AMERICAN INDIAN SUMMER 2013
PHOTOS BY ERNEST AMOROSO
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