• Archeologist Neil Brodie, reveals spikes in looted artifact sales following Muslim majority lands being invaded, such as with Syrian coins post-2011.
• Illicit antiquities, where internet marketplaces, including eBay, are rife with looted items, from Islamic coins to glasswork from Jericho and Hebron.
In Los Angeles, Professor Khaled Abou El Fadl, a Professor of Law at UCLA, teaches Islamic Jurisprudence, Political Crimes and Legal Systems, and Muslims. He was recently visited by an antiquities dealer offering a disturbing gift: a single page from a torn manuscript. “One of the most egregious acts of violence against a manuscript, short of burning it completely, is to rip it up,” El Fadl remarked. Dealers often dismantle rare books, selling pages individually for profit and erasing valuable historical context, references, and insights.
The dealer displayed a catalogue of manuscripts, looted from Timbuktu, which housed a renowned African manuscript collection. In 2012, local families and tribes buried these texts in the desert for preservation, but some fell to looters. The dealer claimed connections with universities in Israel, America and the U.K, ignoring legal implications of trafficking such artifacts. The U.S. has intensified efforts to curb this trade, with New York’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit leading.
El Fadl, despite the scholarly temptation, declined to purchase the collection. He noted that buying such objects, though preserving them, fuels the illegal trade, perpetuating looting, and destruction. “Do I refrain from buying the manuscript in order not to encourage this type of trade?” he questioned, “Or do I risk that a valuable manuscript would be lost to history?” Scholars like El Fadl argue these artifacts belong in libraries for study, not private collections or museums.
El Fadl recounted the broader, complex landscape of illicit antiquities, where internet marketplaces, including eBay, are rife with looted items, from Islamic coins to glasswork from Jericho and Hebron. This thriving trade has been fueled by the bombardment of the Middle East, with social media even facilitating looting and sales. Recent studies, including those by archaeologist Neil Brodie, reveal spikes in artifact sales following Muslim majority lands being invaded, such as with Syrian coins post-2011. Facebook posts even instruct looters on digging techniques, with child labour involved in some cases.
Museum/Heritage Images/Getty Images)
Efforts to counteract this loss include digital preservation projects, like those of Gaza’s Great Omari Mosque collection, completed just before its destruction in 2023. Yet, digital copies can’t replace the originals’ significance. El Fadl has documented shifts in the online artifact market over a decade, with a marked increase in availability and bolder listings, raising questions about the origins of items like illustrated Qurans.
Ultimately, El Fadl believes that to preserve cultural heritage, the trade in looted artifacts must be curtailed. Purchasing illicit objects not only fails to protect history but perpetuates its destruction.
Alhamdulillah, despite such attempts, a vast and resilient body of Islamic history remains meticulously preserved, affirming the origins and truthfulness of Islam. This is powerfully illustrated by even recent discoveries, including Spain’s ‘Excalibur’ sword, dated to the Umayyad Caliphate, and the significant finding of a rock inscription attributed to Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w’s) companion in Ta’if.
Furthermore, a manuscript of the Qur’an, held at the University of Birmingham today, traces its origins back to 1,370 Years! The Qur’an is being preserved orally everyday Alhumdulillah. However, interestingly, radiocarbon dating found this particular manuscript of the holy Qur’an, making it among the earliest in existence.
The pages of this copy of the Holy Qur’an had remained unrecognised in the university library for almost a century. However, the tests provide a range of dates, showing that, with a probability of more than 95%, the parchment was from between 568 and 645.
“They could well take us back to within a few years of the actual founding of Islam,”” said David Thomas, the university’s professor of Christianity and Islam.”
