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The Looting and Recovery of Iraqi Treasures
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Part of a beheaded sculpture lies among rubble after a mob of looters ransacked and looted Iraq's largest archeological museum in Baghdad.
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Milking scene from the Temple of Ninhursag, from Tell al Ubaid, c. 2400 B.C.
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This alabaster relief is one of three fragments from a single stela that dates to the time of the Akkadian Empire in Mesopotamia, c. 2334-2154 B.C.
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Many of the most important artifacts of human history were collected in Baghdad's National Museum of Iraq -- and then looted amid the chaos of the American-lead invasion two years ago.
Though quite a few of these objects have been recovered, many more have not. A new book, The Looting of the Iraq Museum, tries to create a virtual museum with descriptions and pictures of the treasures.
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The director of the museum talks about the looted treasures of Babylon, and the few that have made their way home.
Guest:
Donny George, director of the Iraq Museum in Baghdad; wrote the foreword for the new book The Looting of the Iraq Museum, Baghdad: The Lost Legacy of Ancient Mesopotamia
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. 9(MDA1OTI3MjQ5MDEyODUwMTE2MzM1YzNmZA004))
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