Courtesy of the Italian government, visitors to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York will find an unfamiliar antiquity on view today in each institution’s classical galleries.

The artefacts are the first fruits of separate agreements that Italy reached this year with those museums to return antiquities that Italian officials have long contended were looted or removed illegally from their country. In exchange for the return of the objects — which will include the Euphronios krater, a 2,500-year-old Greek bowl considered one of the world’s finest, from the Met’s collection — Italy agreed to offer extended loans of other antiquities that have rarely or never been seen outside Italy.

The arrival of the artefacts at their temporary homes was timed to coincide with a visit to the United States by Italy’s culture minister, Francesco Rutelli, who has taken a high-profile role in his country’s campaign for the return of looted antiquities.

The two museums are handling his arrival, and that of their new antiquities, in starkly different ways.

The Museum of Fine Arts, which was not the first museum to make a deal with Italy but was the first to return disputed objects, held a news conference with Mr. Rutelli yesterday and stressed that it was also the first American museum to receive loans of Italian antiquities under the new arrangement. (Its loan, a large marble statue from the first century A.D., arrived a couple of weeks ago for conservation work, museum officials said.)

By contrast, the Met, where Mr. Rutelli is scheduled to meet today with Philippe de Montebello, the museum’s director, planned no ceremony and did not even issue a news release to announce the arrival of its loan, a kylix, a type of drinking cup. Citing security issues, museum officials would not say exactly when the cup arrived at the Met...

Italy Lends Antiquities to 2 Museums, Randy Kennedy, New York Times, New York, USA, November 29, 2006.

In contrast, the Getty museum has no reciprocal loan agreement for returning artefacts and talks have collapsed.

Italy Expresses Dismay With Getty’s Stand on Disputed Art, Elisabetto Povoledo, New York Times, New York, USA, November 24, 2006.

cf. Getty Museum Ceases Talks With Italy Over Antiquities, Hugh Eakin and Elisabetto Povoledo, New York Times, New York, USA, November 22, 2006.

Seeking to build on its success in bargaining with a few American museums, Italy has asked the New York collector Shelby White to consider returning more than 20 ancient artefacts that it argues were illegally mined from its soil, officials involved in the negotiations say.

The request was relayed this month in a letter to Ms. White’s lawyers, they said. Rather than implicitly threaten legal action, however, as it occasionally has in pursuing objects in major museum collections, the government hopes to rely on moral suasion, said Maurizio Fiorilli, a lawyer for the Italian Culture Ministry. He said negotiations would begin in earnest in December.

Mr. Fiorilli said the Italian government was not implying that Ms. White or Leon Levy, her husband, who jointly amassed the collection over 30 years, were involved in any crime. (Mr. Levy died in 2003.)

Rather, “we’re showing her that there is significant evidence that links objects in her collection to illegal digs in Italy,” said Mr. Fiorilli, who leads the government commission seeking restitution of illegally excavated archaeological artefacts...

Top Collector Is Asked to Relinquish Artefacts, Elisabetta Povoledo, The New York Times, New York, USA, November 29, 2006.

cf. Shelby White on this blog previously here: $200 Million Gift Prompts a Debate Over Antiquities.

A 50-year-old Frenchman has been arrested for trying to sell locks of hair he said were taken from the mummy of Egypt's most famous pharaoh, Ramses II, officers have said.

Jean-Michel Diebolt, a postman from the French Alps, had placed an ad on an Internet site (www.vivastreet.fr) offering snips of hair, samples of the mummy's embalming resin and bits of bandages for more than 2,000 euros (2,633 dollars).

He claimed the lot came into his possession via his father who was part of a team of French scientists tasked with analysing the royal mummy 30 years ago.

Police arrested the man at his home in the Alpine village of Saint Egreve late Tuesday and were holding him for questioning on suspicion of trying to sell Egyptian property without authorisation...

Frenchman arrested for trying to sell lock of pharaoh's hair, AFP via Yahoo! News, USA, November 29, 2006.

Frenchman tries to sell Ramses II hair, Reuters, UK, November 29, 2006.

Man held for 'pharaoh relic' sale, BBC News, UK, November 29, 2006.

'We want full transparency about scandal', Independent Online, South Africa, November 29, 2006.

The latest issue of Current World Archaeology is out now and contains three article of interest to Egyptophiles.

• Revealing terra incognita, Dangeil, Sudan
  Excavations at the late Kushite (3rd century BC – 4th century AD) city of Dangeil in Sudan reveal a temple of Amun, and a massive bread-making facility. By Julie R. Anderson and Salah Mohamed Ahmed. (9 pages)
• News: Tomb Radar. New Tomb in the Valley of the Kings?
  Archaeologist Nicholas Reeves led a radar survey of the Valley of the Kings in 2000, as part of the Amarna Royal Tombs Project (ARTP). Information revealed by the survey suggests that a new tomb, tentatively being labelled KV-64, lies in the vicinity of the Tomb of Tutankhamun (KV-62). (1 page)
• Letters: Desert Glass
  Professor Saeed A. Durrani replies to the article View from the Field: In search of desert glass from CWA 18.

Current World Archaeology, Think Publishing, London, UK, Volume 2, No. 7, Issue 19, October / November 2006.

Subscribe to Current World Archaeology Magazine via Amazon.com.

One king’s reign heralded revolution. The other’s brought restoration. And after a later ruler set out to erase the pair from history, both were forgotten for more than 3,000 years.

The beginning of the now-famous story of King Tut and the revolutionary pharaoh who was his probable father is on display in “Amarna: Ancient Egypt's Place in the Sun,” running through October 2007 at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.

The exhibit, featuring more than 100 artefacts from the boy-pharaoh Tutankhamun’s birthplace of Amarna, serves as a sister exhibition to the Franklin Institute’s blockbuster Tut show that opens Feb. 3 [2007].

“We wanted to get something up that would truly complement that show,” said Pam Kosty, a Penn Museum spokeswoman. “This was just perfect. It's the childhood home of Tut...”

King Tut and his radical dad, Alison Lapp, AP via The Morning Call, Pennsylvannia, USA, November 26, 2006.

For the first time, The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens is selling tickets to their upcoming exhibit. But this exhibit is unlike any other that has been at the museum.

“Temples and Tombs: Treasures of Egyptian Art from The British Museum” opens Dec. 22 [2006] and runs through March 18 [2007].

“As an international exhibition, there are higher finance conditions than most exhibits,” said Maarten van de Guchte, director of the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens. “We wanted to bring a first-rate, blockbuster to Jacksonville, but to do so we had to increase ticket prices.”

The museum is expecting record attendance and tickets are on sale now...

Cummer expects huge crowds for Egyptian exhibit; but it’ll cost, Caroline Gabsewics, Jacksonville’s Financial News and Daily Record, Florida, USA, November 28, 2006.