Thai antiquities from Ban Chiang that Trevor Murphy is trying to get repatriated to Thailand. This bangle contains human bones. (Courtesy Murphy)
This bronze bangle is some 3,500 years old. Inside is a piece of the arm it once rested on, complete with human bone.
There are dozens of clay pots and finely painted vases, beads of stone and glass, bronze bells and rattles and bracelets and necklaces, even a mold to make metal axe heads (a skill some archaeologists argue didn’t exist in Thailand 3,500 years ago).
Which is to say, it’s not an inconsequential collection of antiquities. Is is, however, an itinerant one, and getting it home is harder than you might think.
This quixotic task has fallen to Trevor Murphy, a fiduciary in Laguna Beach. He’s handling the estate of an Orange County man who served in Vietnam and became fascinated with archaeology. “Chai Dwahat Antiques,” one of the original receipts says. “All Ban Chiang. 17 pieces….All guarantee 4,500-5,600 years old. 4th March, 1972.”
Total cost for those pieces? $400.
UNESCO considers Ban Chiang the most important prehistoric settlement discovered in South-East Asia. There are some 50 pieces in this collection, and for decades they were lovingly displayed behind glass in the man’s Orange County home. As the years went by, though, he became uneasy with his collection. The Indiana Jones era was gone. The ethics of Western collecting had come into stark and unflattering relief.
Thai antiquities from Ban Chiang that Trevor Murphy is trying to get repatriated to Thailand. This bangle shows human bones. (Courtesy Murphy)
The Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, you may remember, was raided by federal agents in 2008, interested in dozens of artifacts allegedly smuggled illegally from Thailand and American Indian lands. Over recent years the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles has returned terra cotta figures to Italy; the Denver Art Museum has sent antiquities back to Cambodia; the Smithsonian Institution has returned Benin bronzes to Nigeria; New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art sent statues back to Thailand; UCLA’s Fowler Museum returned royal objects to the Asante Kingdom in Ghana (marking the 150th anniversary of the looting of said objects during the sacking of the city of Kumasi by British colonial troops in 1874).
Having just returned from the Parthenon, I can tell you that many Greeks are angrily awaiting repatriation of antiquities from the British Museum.
So in an addendum to the man’s will, his final request was for all the Ban Chiang pottery to be returned to Thailand.
“I have a moral obligation, and a fiduciary duty, to get these things home,” Murphy said.
I’ve known Murphy for decades, and I’ve often wondered what exactly it is that licensed fiduciaries in California do. This has been an intriguing education.
The effort to repatriate the antiquities began last year. Murphy thought it might be as simple as contacting Thai officials and handing them over. He started with the Royal Thai Embassy in Washington. Then tried university academics specializing in antiquities repatriation. Then he tried the Thai consulate in Los Angeles.
“The Royal Thai Consulate-General in Los Angeles does not have a policy of receiving antiquities as gifts directly from donors,” the consulate said by email. “As we have been liaised closely with U.S. Homeland Security Investigation (HSI) during the repatriation of several Thai antiquities back to Thailand, we agree to follow the guideline of HSI that donors are advised to contact HSI regarding artifacts/antiquities they wish to donate in order to be sent back to the country of origin.”
Thai antiquities from Ban Chiang that Trevor Murphy is trying to get repatriated to Thailand. This mold suggests people were working on metal axe heads. (Courtesy Murphy)
The consulate directed him to ICE’s Tip Line.
So there he went. “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) investigates more than 400 violations of criminal law, ranging from child exploitation to transnational gangs,” the online form says. “Use this form to report suspected criminal activity.”
Criminal activity?!
“Please check the violation that best applies,” it continues. “Benefit/Marriage Fraud. Bulk Cash Smuggling/Financial Crimes. Child Exploitation/Pornography. Cyber Crimes. Employment/Exploitation of Unlawful Workers….Fugitive Criminal Alien. Gang Related. Human Rights Violators. Human Smuggling. Human Trafficking (Forced Labor/Slavery)…. Narcotics Smuggling. Terrorism Related….Weapons Smuggling….”
It was a bit terrifying. Murphy put the quest on the back burner while he finished executing the rest of the estate. And then, on Tuesday, July 17, he called the ICE Tip Line.
An Alexa-type voice menu offered the same terrifying options that the online form has. “Other,” he chose as his category.
Musak played. At each extended pause he tensed a little, expecting to hear an agent’s voice.
And so it went for more than an hour. I heard about his recent trip to the Cook Islands. He heard about my recent trip to Greece.
Trevor Murphy (Courtesy Murphy)
I was preparing to leave when an agent finally came on the line. Murphy calmly recounted the whole story, detailed what’s in the collection, where it’s stored, how eager he is to get the pieces home.
“I’m very glad you called,” the agent said. He’d alert the local office that handles these types of cases — “that will happen very quickly,” he promised — then experts will examine the collection and figure out what’s next.
Murphy was pleased. A step forward. A step toward home. But still such a long way away.
Several days have passed; still no word. Stay tuned.
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