British Museum Staffer Busted for Theft

[DonnaML]

1 hour ago, Sol_Invictus said:

If the person responsible for recording the objects was also the person who was stealing them, then perhaps it’s not the museum’s fault for not having records of the items. Instead their fault is in trusting the wrong person, and in not keeping a sufficiently close eye on their staff.

But I would think that the British Museum already owned all or most of the stolen jewelry long before this person's tenure. So I don't think the failure to record the items in their collection can be laid at his door. Clearly, he targeted these items because they weren't recorded in inventory. 

[DonnaML]

37 minutes ago, Heliodromus said:

I recently contacted the BM coin dept inquiring after a unique-for-issue coin they acquired from the famous Bourton-on-the-Water hoard in 1972. I only knew about the coin from a hoard report - no mention of it on the BM site, which is why I asked for confirmation (& hopefully a photo).

I got a polite, but ultimately useless reply, that yes they (think?) they have the coin, and here's the online link to it.

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_1972-0627-1

No photo, no mention of reverse type, bust type, legends, provenance ... Just - a 5.000g Constantine coin from Lyons acquired in 1972.

Maybe asking too much for them to have already cataloged a unique coin they held back from a hoard only 50 years ago!

Who know, maybe it's been stolen and will appear on eBay shortly. I guess sans photo anything not weighing 5.000g is fair game. 😃

 

Well, there is a reference at the bottom of the entry (very hard to see with most of the page hidden by the huge bars at the top and bottom) to RIC 6 311. (With a question mark for the page number, because of course nobody at the British Museum has access to an actual copy of RIC 6!) And if you go to OCRE, there's indeed a reference (without a photo) to this specimen, together with another specimen (with a photo) acquired by the British Museum in 1927. See https://numismatics.org/ocre/id/ric.6.lug.311 , with details on the obverse and reverse.  Surely you don't expect the museum itself to provide that information! It's too bad that BMCRE never got past Vol. VI (Severus Alexander to Pupienus), published in 1963.  Maybe that's when they threw their hands in the air and gave up. Not like the good old days from 1873-1927, when they published 29 volumes in the series of the British Museum Catalogue of Greek Coins.

Edited October 12, 2023 by DonnaML

[Sol_Invictus]

16 minutes ago, DonnaML said:

But I would think that the British Museum already owned all or most of the stolen jewelry long before this person's tenure. So I don't think the failure to record the items in their collection can be laid at his door. Clearly, he targeted these items because they weren't recorded in inventory. 

Good point.

[Heliodromus]

1 hour ago, DonnaML said:

Well, there is a reference at the bottom of the entry (very hard to see with most of the page hidden by the huge bars at the top and bottom) to RIC 6 311. (With a question mark for the page number, because of course nobody at the British Museum has access to an actual copy of RIC 6!) And if you go to OCRE, there's indeed a reference (without a photo) to this specimen, together with another specimen (with a photo) acquired by the British Museum in 1927.

I hadn't noticed that link, but it's rather interesting for two reasons:

1) That is NOT the type in question (which is unlisted - not in RIC), not even the right issue !

2) The 2nd BM coin, ex. Llangarren hoard, is clearly unofficial (and as such very rare) - despite no mention of this by the BM

Doh !

Edit: And to make matters worse, that unofficial BM coin is actually the RIC type specimen for RIC VI Lyons 311, which makes it pretty likely that THAT type doesn't actually exist.

P.S. For anyone curious, the BOW hoard coin in question is a PRINCIPI IVVENTVTIS from the PLG S-F issue (David Burge, NC 13, 1973, p104).

Edited October 12, 2023 by Heliodromus

[Hrefn]

7 hours ago, Heliodromus said:

I recently contacted the BM coin dept inquiring after a unique-for-issue coin they acquired from the famous Bourton-on-the-Water hoard in 1972. I only knew about the coin from a hoard report - no mention of it on the BM site, which is why I asked for confirmation (& hopefully a photo).

I got a polite, but ultimately useless reply, that yes they (think?) they have the coin, and here's the online link to it.

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_1972-0627-1

No photo, no mention of reverse type, bust type, legends, issue, provenance ... Just a 5.000g Constantine coin from Lyons acquired in 1972.

Maybe asking too much for them to have already cataloged a unique coin they held back from a hoard only 50 years ago!

Who knows, maybe it's been stolen and will appear on eBay shortly. I guess sans photo anything not weighing 5.000g is fair game. 😃

 

Beware of round numbers.  Whatever the coin’s mass, it is probably not 5.000 grams.   Maybe between 4 and six grams.  Likely somewhat hefted the coin and said I think this is about 5 grams.   If the museum said it weighed 5.038 grams it would be more credible.

.  

[Ryro]

8 hours ago, Heliodromus said:

I recently contacted the BM coin dept inquiring after a unique-for-issue coin they acquired from the famous Bourton-on-the-Water hoard in 1972. I only knew about the coin from a hoard report - no mention of it on the BM site, which is why I asked for confirmation (& hopefully a photo).

I got a polite, but ultimately useless reply, that yes they (think?) they have the coin, and here's the online link to it.

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_1972-0627-1

No photo, no mention of reverse type, bust type, legends, issue, provenance ... Just a 5.000g Constantine coin from Lyons acquired in 1972.

Maybe asking too much for them to have already cataloged a unique coin they held back from a hoard only 50 years ago!

Who knows, maybe it's been stolen and will appear on eBay shortly. I guess sans photo anything not weighing 5.000g is fair game. 😃

 

Same! They referred me to a different area in the museum that never responded. I reached out again. And again, no response. 

I hope this happens again on a much larger scale, but that the person who sells/ gives the items away gives all known information on the items. So that whomever receives the items can take better care of them the the BM 

[Heliodromus]

53 minutes ago, Hrefn said:

Likely somewhat hefted the coin and said I think this is about 5 grams.

Yes - then threw it in a shoebox where it's been collecting dust for the last 50 years.

 

[Theodosius]

The difference between museums and private collectors is that most private collectors had to work hard to earn the money they used buy their coins and thus they value them for the effort it took to acquire them in addition to their collectable value. Private collectors therefore tend to take good care of the items in their collections. 

You'd think the British museum could bother to photograph and catalog all the items in their "care". It wouldn't take a lot of creativity to partner with universities and get students who are interested in various areas to do a lot of this work. 

It will take them 100 years to recover their credibility if ever. 

John