Neil Brodie’s research while affiliated with University of Oxford and other places

... Interest in the academic publication of such pieces has played an enabling role in downplaying and sugarcoating the horror of illicit digs and the resulting loss of context (Wiseman 1984;Enríquez Navascués and Jiménez 2005;Renfrew 2000, p. 10;Brodie and Renfrew 2005;Brodie 2011). In fact, many archaeologists dedicated to the study of illicit trafficking seem to be more comfortable working at criminological research centers than archaeological ones (Brodie 2015a). In short, archaeometry seeks and offers responses to questions and quandaries arising from archaeological research. ...

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Forensic Archaeometry Applied to Antiquities Trafficking: The Beginnings of an Investigation at the Frontiers of Knowledge

... Ultimately, by importing these illicit antiquities, the Green family has shown a blatant disregard for Iraq's sovereignty and right to cultural self-determination (Brodie, 2020). They have ensured that the control over any future flow of these artifacts lies in either their hands or those of the US government (Brodie, 2020). ...

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Hobby Lobby’s Hammurabi Robbing Hobby: Power and Appropriation at the Museum of the Bible

... The cultural heritage discourse in and of the Middle East over the past decades has focused significantly on catastrophe: the large-scale looting of archaeological sites and museums in the wake of military conflict (Emberling and Hanson 2008;Polk and Schuster 2005) and the dramatized destruction of sites and artifacts as a means of terrorizing local and global audiences (De Cesari 2015;Harmanşah 2015). Due to the volatile political situation in some parts of the region, the international response over the past decade has been to implement mostly remote monitoring of site conditions (e.g., Bewley et al. 2016;Danti, Branting, and Penacho 2017); the cataloging of lost artifacts (Isakhan 2015;Reichel 2008) and, more recently, their digital recreation (Thompson 2018); the invisible tagging of remaining museum objects (Matthews 2020); and a heightened effort to better understand and curtail the illicit antiquities market (Brodie 2008(Brodie , 2011. ...

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Archaeology as Cultural Heritage in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq

... However, as previously mentioned, firm claims on scale and size of art theft are hard to make. Several statements circulating in professional and academic circles claim that "the illicit trade is the third largest criminal enterprise" or that it "grosses 3 billion annually", however this is entirely without statistical merit, and, as explained by Yates and Brodie (2023), in reality a so-called factoid. ...

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Before the hammer falls: an empirical analysis of the market reaction to art thefts

... However, this narrative is not completely accurate, because from the nineteenth century textual and historical artefacts were obtained en masse through the hands of ancient historians, biblical scholars papyrologists, Assyriologists and Egyptologists, among others. Their role in extracting heritage has come to the surface more clearly in recent years due to the involvement of scholars from these disciplines in the study and authentication of artefacts of dubious provenance (Brodie 2011;Bonnie, in press;Brodie, Kersel and Rasmussen 2023;Mazza 2019). Through their research, these disciplines have shaped the interpretation of heritage from the Middle East for decades, with little attention to its impact on local communities. ...

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Afterword: On Ethics, Cultural Capital and Sustainability

... adoption of prestigious exotic items by the Cycladic elites/seafarers), resulting from the breakdown of distinct regional patterns and the rise of sites controlling cross-Aegean and extra-Aegean communications (Nakou 1997;Şahoğlu 2019). Nodal sites, such as Poliochni and Troy, as well as emerging special sites in the Cyclades like Dhaskalio-Keros (Renfrew et al. 2022) and others (Kastri-Syros, Mt. Kynthos-Delos, Panormos-Naxos, etc.), show both common material elements witnessing to their outreach and spatial delineation/protection from outsiders (fortifications, evidence for destructions, spearheads linked with the spread of tin bronze), but also diverse mechanisms of adopting innovations. ...

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Longevity, creativity, and mobility at the “oldest city in Europe”: ceramic traditions and cultural interactions at Poliochni-Lemnos, northeast Aegean

... At the same time, recurring international police operations (usually a collaboration between Interpol, Europol, and local law enforcement agencies, e.g., 'Operation Pandora'), yearly see tens of thousands of cultural objects seized in global networks that span over 100 countries. It is safe to say therefore that the illicit trade in these materials is large (Brodie et al., 2022). This global network furthermore poses significant challenges, not only for policing, but also for the return of cultural objects which has to do with the concept of 'ownership'. ...

Reference:

Before the hammer falls: an empirical analysis of the market reaction to art thefts

... This is further verified by the results of the charcoal analysis from the West House and its surroundings, where Bottema-MacGillavry (2005, p. 102) has recovered branches of the taxon, whose morphology is indicative of coppicing or pruning of the trees. Further evidence for the utilization of olive tree in the Cyclades during the Early Cycladic period comes from the archaeological site of Dhaskalio, where the inhabitants were managing olive trees in order to obtain construction timber and possibly fodder ( Ntinou, 2013). The increase of the other fruit-bearing species, could suggest that arboriculture took place from the Middle Cycladic period onwards. ...

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Landscape and wood-fuel in Akrotiri (Thera, Greece) during the Bronze Age

... See also Abd el-Gawad and Gallart Marqués, this volume. 69 The term "postcolonial" has also been critiqued for its failure to bring about meaningful decolonisation, as well as the origins of the employment of the term in colonial contexts in which it "doesn't strive to undo colonialism but rather to remake it and subvert it" (Tuck and Yang 2012, 19 Chippindale and Gill 2000;Chippindale et al. 2001;Brodie et al. 2013;Mackenzie et al. 2019;Brodie et al. 2022;Stevenson 2022. 78 Renfrew 2000Tubb 2007Tubb , 2012. ...

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Teaching the Ancient World with Reproductions

... After the connection of looted antiquities from Cambodia with the activi ties of British dealer Douglas Latchford (Brodie, 2019a), he and some family members created the first of their trusts, named Skanda, on the island of Jersey. After a while, they set up a second one named Siva, in the same location. ...

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Fraud Schemes in the Antiquities Market