Lost, stolen or even damaged. Who has forgotten those three aggressive designations that the British Museum used on 2,000 objects in its collection two months ago? No one, least of all the organization itself, trying to save anything that can be saved. The positive development came this week. 350 treasures were recovered and began their return journey to the museum.

“There’s still a lot to learn from what happened,” the museum’s board chairman, George Osborne, reiterated at a culture ministry committee meeting on Wednesday, calling both himself and the museum “victims of a job insider”.

Damage to the reputation of the British Museum

It wasn’t until August that the museum realized that nearly 2,000 objects in its collection, from the Hellenistic and Roman periods, had gone missing. The disappearance involved smaller archaeological finds, such as jewelry and precious stones, which were in a museum warehouse for academic and research purposes. After it became known, its director of eight years, Hartwig Fischer, resigned.

But the damage was already done. The reputation of the British Museum was damaged, while its general function was called into question for the first time in the 270 years since its establishment. Professors of archeology and the industry in general called the event “unacceptable”, while several countries, including Greece, demanded even more strongly the return of their own antiquities.

Christos Tsirogiannis/ Photo credit: Macedonia

The new decisions that the museum has to make are many and difficult. Acting Director Sir Mark Jones announced: “We will be digitizing our entire collection.” This means that the whole world will be able to see any archaeological find in the collection, from the smallest to the largest, through the organization’s website. “I strongly believe that the best response to thieves is to increase the visibility of the collection. Because the more a collection becomes known, the faster any loss will be noticed,” he said.

The Greek archaeologist in the new museum project

This project is estimated to take five years to complete, as the museum has almost eight million archaeological finds. According to the statements, however, the theft policy has already changed and security has been tightened.

In the museum’s attempt to clean up the unprecedented chaos, it enlisted Christos Tsirogiannis a month ago. The Greek archaeologist and academic specializes in identifying antiquities that were trafficked illegally and in violation of the UNESCO Convention for the Protection of Cultural Treasures. He is considered one of the leading scientists internationally in the field of forensic archaeology.

In fact, he has taken on two tasks. He will lead the search for the stolen antiquities, and study the museum’s collection itself. In particular, it will examine the possibility of objects in the collection that have reached the museum through antiquities theft or smuggling and, if this is indeed the case, will see to it that they are returned to the countries of rightful ownership.

It is interesting that he himself had approached the museum a year before to take over the project since then. However, he had not received a response from the museum’s director at the time, so it only got the green light in September, after the theft scandal broke. “I hope this move shows a change in the mindset of the organization,” said Christos Tsirogiannis to the Telegraph newspaper.