Antiquities right of return

I am among those fortunate enough to not only have visited the cream of the Middle East’s major historical sites — among them Persepolis, the Valley of the Kings, Palmyra and Baalbek — but also viewed antiquities taken from these places in European and American museums. Few people in Iran, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon have the same opportunity. Though the ancient palaces and structures may remain, much of what they held is no longer on site, or even in the country. Spirited away over the past 200 odd years, many of the region’s most famous artifacts are in the West, torn from their historical and spatial context through acts of Elginism. The term — defined as cultural vandalism — was coined after the Earl of Elgin, who removed the Parthenon Marbles from Athens in the early 18th century to decorate his house in Scotland. At the Louvre in Paris recently,