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Message:: [QUOTE="SeptimusT, post: 6451866, member: 91240"]Utterly bizarre. The 'experts' that they consulted regarding bronze disease are stultifyingly ignorant. I also want to point out this paragraph: <blockquote>The University of Washington Libraries petitioned CBP in 2019 for donation of the coins. Faculty plan to use the coins to: highlight awareness of illegal excavation and the antiquities trade; discuss the societies in which they were created and circulated; and illuminate the complex issues of cultural heritage raised by modern antiquities trade.</blockquote> This tells us that UW reached out to the government and specifically asked for these stolen coins, the vast majority of which are not 'antiquities' by any stretch. Unless there is much more to this story than we are made aware of here, then this seems quite an illegal seizure. It is sickening beyond measure that taxpayer dollars funded not only this, but a ceremony to present stolen goods to the university. That the librarian (who is, from what I can tell, wholly unqualified to speak about these coins or oversee their conservation) would make such an ignorant comment as that they are an important part of the history of 'communication and bookmaking' or that they contain '3,000 years of history' makes me even sadder. Even speaking as a budding academic, people like this make it no wonder to me that so many people dislike academia so much.[/QUOTE]