Yale to Return Machu Picchu Artifacts to Peru

Here's the BBC's coverage of the major repatriation effort between Yale University and Peru: the return of thousands of artifacts taken from the site of Machu Picchu by Yale professor Hiram Bingham nearly a century ago. I believe this a truly momentous event in the world of cultural heritage repatriation, for it involves both one of the most prestigious academic institutions in the world, and one of the most-visited and most-loved archaeological (and now archaeological-tourist) sites in the world. Hopefully, Yale's clout will inspire other major Western institutions holding objects of questionable provenience to follow suit.

The details of this agreement show that repatriation can be mutually beneficial for both the home nation and the outside institutions where these objects often end up; there will be a scholarly exchange between Yale-based American and Peruvian academics, as well as a traveling exhibit of the pieces to bring the pieces to an even wider audience than they have encountered by being at the school.

Some might say that keeping objects such as these in American and European museums is more beneficial than sending them home, because it inspires Westerners who see them on display to want to visit the places where they originally came from. In this case, given that Machu Picchu is one of the most famous ancient sites in the world, and has such a strong hold in popular imagination, I can't imagine that many people need the prompting of a few artifacts in a museum to want to go to Peru and see it for themselves!

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