Mongolian dinosaur in New York
Mongolian dinosaur seized from US warehouse
Updated: Sat, 23 Jun 2012 02:54:26 GMT | By Agence France-Presse
A gigantic tyrannosaurus skeleton — tucked away in a New York warehouse — was seized by US authorities, who hope to return the prehistoric remains to their native Mongolia, officials said.
Mongolian dinosaur seized from US warehouse
The skeleton, about eight feet (2.43 meters) tall and a whopping 24 feet (7.31m) wide, was locked up at Cadogan Tate Fine Art storage facility after being sold last month at Heritage Auctions for $1.05 million.
A spokesperson for the auction house on Friday confirmed the seizure to AFP.
The tyrannosaurus — a tarbosaurus bataar — walked Central Asia’s Gobi Desert on two feet at the end of the Cretaceous period, some 70 million years ago.
In May 2010, the skeleton was shipped to Florida from Britain. It was sold at a New York auction on May 20 for $1.05 million by Heritage Auctions.
But according to documents filed Monday in US District Court in New York, it is alleged to have been illegally imported from Britain through false claims about what it was and its value.
A Manhattan prosecutor filed to seize the reconstituted skeleton Monday and return it to Mongolian authorities, who had tried in vain to prevent the sale, and the request was approved by judge Kevin Casten.
In 1924, Mongolia determined that fossils are national property, and their export is strictly forbidden.
Mongolian President Tsakhia Elbegdorj rejoiced Monday at the legal proceedings, saying the tyrannosaurus represents an important part of the Mongolian people’s cultural heritage.
“We are one step closer to bringing this rare tyrannosaurus bataar skeleton back home to the people of Mongolia,” he said in a statement sent to AFP.
“Today we send a message to looters all over the world: We will not turn a blind eye to the marketplace of looted fossils.”
It was not immediately clear when the remains would be handed over but Robert Painter, a lawyer representing Mongolia, said he and his clients were confident they would be repatriated “in the near future.”
Heritage Auctions’ co-chair Jim Halperin, meanwhile, said there should be a “fair and just” solution for Florida-based seller Eric Prokopi.
He “spent a year of his life and considerable expense identifying, restoring, mounting and preparing what had previously been a much less valuable matrix of disassembled, underlying bones and bone fragments.”
Prokopi has denied being an international trafficker of historical artifacts.
Source: http://news.malaysia.msn.com/weird-news/mongolian-dinosaur-seized-from-us-warehouse-4
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After some googling, I found out that many of the fossils stolen have been returned back to Mongolia. I’m glad that US fulfilled what they have promised. Mongolia is noted to have some of the largest dinosaur fossil beds in the world. I believe it’s largely due to its vastness and not much big scale explorations done at the moment, but then that’s a good news!
P/s : Online pic.
Mongolia is a country in Asia bordered by China and Russia . There were many species of dinosaurs have been found here, including Velociraptor, Tarbosaurus, and Gallimimus. Asia’s largest desert Mongolian Gobi was once paradise for plants and animals, including dinosaurs. Dinosaurs do exist million years ago ever since. It was a site of mass extinction, where avalanche-like sudden sand-slides both swept dinosaurs away and preserved their remains. These prehistorically favourable conditions make the Gobi Desert the largest dinosaur fossil reservoir in the world. Fossil poaching is a huge problem worldwide. Many of them been smuggled to the Western countries and are sold illegally. A gigantic tyrannosaurus skeleton was seized by US authorities, and to return the prehistoric remains to their native Mongolia. That’s wonderful. Mongolia determined that fossils are national property, and an important part of the Mongolian people’s cultural heritage. Many of the fossil excavated have been lost to smugglers. Mongolia is campaigning to return the remains to their rightful home. They have tightened laws to protect dinosaur fossils from being smuggled out after the country lost many of the finest examples.
Thank you Rinpoche for this sharing.
The great Protector Manjushri Dorje Shugden depicted in the beautiful Mongolian style. I hope many Mongolians will print out this image and place in their houses to create an affinity with Dorje Shugden for greater blessings. To download a high resolution file: https://bit.ly/2Nt3FHz
The powerful Mongolian nation has a long history and connection with Manjushri Dorje Shugden, as expressed in the life of Venerable Choijin Lama, a State Oracle of Mongolia who took trance of Dorje Shugden among other Dharma Protectors. Read more about Choijin Lama: https://bit.ly/2GCyOUZ
Wow …..amazing to see even it is just pictures of dinosaur not say this a gigantic tyrannosaurus skeleton. Rejoice what they the US authorities did ……returning the prehistoric remains back to the country of origin. Amazingly , Mongolia holds the world’s richest dinosaur fossil finds,in the Gobi desert..In the Gobi’s Flaming Cliffs site, in southern Mongolia, where the first dinosaur eggs were discovered in the 1920s.
US authorities and the Mogolian government are doing a difficult task to combat fossil poaching and black market sales which is a decades-old problem.
Despite efforts to criminalize illegal sales,it still happen due to the greed of someone and market out there. It’s important that fossils be repatriated because they are part of Mogolian natural and cultural heritage..
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this post.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this article. I just don’t understand how these people can be so greedy for money until they can do such a thing like smuggling a mongolian dinasour fossil into New York to be auction. Thanks to the authorities who are now returning it to the government of Mongolia.
With folded palms,
Vivian
From this we can tell the type of greed that people have for items that do not belong to them at all. It is just sad because these people are driven by their greed. The worst part is that, they think that when they have the money, they will have the happiness that they are looking for. But sad to say, that happiness is never there. It is only there because of the perception that they had. And when these people can’t get that happiness that they look for, they would turn to stealing more items for more money just to fill up the emptiness that will never be filled up with material items.
This is not something new that people are selling and buying illegally or underground, but it is sad to see cases like this increasing year after year, it shows how much degeneration our mind is.
Without the law, without Dharma, I can’t imagine how will this world be. This is just one of the case that found out, how many other illegal selling in every corner of the world that is not exposed?
It is such a shame that people are willing to pay big money on the black market for dinosaur bones and Mongolia is one of the places where many bones were being dug up and transported against the law.
The skeletal remains of this dinosaur are of tremendous cultural and historic significance to the people of Mongolia and provide a connection to the country’s prehistoric past and it is only right to return to its rightful place.
Looting has been a historical activity. One of the greatest plunders happened when British troops burned down the Summer Palace in Beijing 150 years ago. Funny thing is that the British are afraid of allowing the Chinese to archive the Chinese artifacts because they are in fear that the Chinese will request for their return. How absurd is this???
How can the British steal and then be in fear that they are requested to return the stolen treasures? What message is the British sending out to the world and her citizens? That it’s ok to steal?
Please read the news article here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/6374959/China-to-study-British-Museum-for-looted-artefacts.html
Greed really destroys one’s character!
These kinds of issues was happened mostly in Ching Dynasty when all the foreign countries invaded China and took lots of antiques back to their countries. They took advantages due to Chinese government weakness. This judgement provides a good law case example to those people who took any antiques from China should return back to them. Isn’t it right to return the things to the original owner?
When reading an article like this ,it is easy to get into a for or against position. The Mongolian laws are there to prevent such smuggling but obviously there are loopholes in the enforcement or implementation system. Most likely it is not so much the system but the greed of those involved for personal gain one way or another.Legal and moral issues aside, on a brighter note,what were fragmentary pieces of bones which will only interest specialists had now been assembled into an object of global interest. I agree with Wah Ying that it should not be an excuse to lessen the owner’s illegal action and due process of the law must take its place.
When I was a kid I used to have this question of how in the world that the museum would have all other countries’ artifacts or antiques which aren’t they supposed to be their own respective country property. Illegal smuggling has been around way back during the old days due to greed and selfishness.
From small to such a huge skeleton obviously it’s still the same issue and sadly the trafficker would only look for their own greediness rather than rationally think of the important of preserving the historical fact of the country.
How scary when a person just look into themselves and all the selfishness will only damages others.
This shows how important spirituality is in benefiting other and eventually the country.
Dinosaur did exist! Most of us thought it was just fiction and legendary folk tales for kids’ bedtime. I am glad to hear this gigantic tyrannosaurus skeleton will be returned to Mongolia where it belonged.
i wonder how many other valuable “stuff” are still not exposed yet? it will be neat if all of those return back to their own national museum, then all of us have a chance to visit and learn, and preserve our history.
What you think?
I think it is really great that the Mongolians get to preserve their own history and artifacts. it will help them to realise that life on earth did not start with Adam and Eve but huge prehistoric creatures like dinosaurs 🙂
沒想到恐龍骷髏是那麼的值錢。從蒙古運至英國在到美國，噢，那是多麼遠的距離。有錢能使鬼推墨，走私犯想尽辦法就是要將它運出蒙古，为了就是錢。天網恢恢，终究還是被繩之于法。人類貪婪之心，往往會讓人們做出違法的事。虽然知道是錯，终究選择做。做任何事都需要背負責任，再小的過失，也要三思而行。
Yes, this tyrannosaurus is finally going home to where it originated. The trade of artifacts and antiques are not legal in many countries, therefore it will attract a lot of black market and illegal transactions. It is so sad to see many rich cultural heritage of countries being traded by greedy parties.
This is how our world is heading to, people could openly “steal” from others then sell the “spoils” at the open market. Amazing right! This practice happened from up to the level of a nation and down to an individual. For many cases museum is just a place to “legalized” whatever stolen from other countries, communities or persons. They argued that their peoples need to be educated by visiting to the museums, so do they mean that those original owners’ posterity do not need to be educated? Anyway just another very selfish excuse!
Thank you for sharing, Rinpoche.
Greedy will cover the eye of human, just like the trafficker can move the skeleton of dinosaur from Mogolian to New York.However Intergrity show us how US government try to return the Skeleton to the owner.Bad or good is a line , just depend ur choice…
我们的无知与贪婪的让这种事情发生。这种行动。认我们完全感到耻辱。希望蒙古恐龙骨骼不会被拍卖，恐龙骨骼应保持在博物馆里。就像一本历史书让更多的人民了解一代传一代。
This is totally the reflected on human’s greeds and selfishness!! They should share this to the world as it is a very beneficial education for the world.
Many valuables and national treasures were taken by colonists motivated by greed through conquest over land and properties of others. Today, the people they once colonised are in the colonists country. Looks like karma in action, you reap what you sow.
This set of dinosaur bones sure does look magnificent. Unfortunately the acquisition of it is illegal. This pre-historic artifact does give us a glimpse of the past where no man has been before. Glad that it is returning home to it’s country. Also the authorities are making a stand for not compromising on looters and will continue to take action.
I agree with Yoke Fui where there are a lot of Asian national treasures that were smuggled away to the West during wartime. The West bought those treasure at dirt cheap price because they know that the locals needed the money for survival. That is why you can see Chinese artifact is most of the museums in the West.
The Mongolian dinosaur skeleton should keep in the museum to let more peoples and the rest generation know about this. Just like a history book, if we keep the history book for our own then our next generation would not get any information from the past.
Greed that cause by desire due to our ignorance let this kind of matter arise. We totally feel shame with this kind of action. Hopefully it will be not been auction and can be continuously display in the museum.
It’s really nice to see the American government trying to return the bones to their rightful country instead of trying to protect those who illegally moved and try to own the nature heritage for personal financial gain.
To see the looters, grave robbers, and others who try to appropriate history’s treasures for personal financial gain make someone think of animals trafficker who hunt and trade animals for money as well.
The statement by Heritage Auctions’ co-chair Jim Halperin on seller Eric Prokopi who “spent a year of his life and considerable expense identifying, restoring a previously much less valuable matrix of disassembled bone fragments”, should have a “fair and just” solution is kind of funny and ridiculous.
It sounds like a baby trafficker/trader who claims”I have feed this baby so much milk and put in so much time and money to keep him/her, and now you plan to seize him/her away from me? I want fair solution!”
I believe that in any communities, be those as big as countries or as small as organisations, leadership is of paramount importance. Leaders set example through their words and actions, and these can be be a lot more powerful and influential in effecting works.
In this example, clearly, US authorities have done the right thing.
And of course, in this world where more is always better than less and where money is never enough, greed can push people to do many wrong things.
It will be nice if this valuable history be placed in the right place to generate funds for the good causes.
A visit to some of the biggest muziums in the West will uncover items which were “taken” from other parts of the world such as Ming vases from China, artifacts from Egypt, images of Buddha from India/China etc. When questioned the mode through which these precious items came to the Muzium, the Board argued that if not for their “acquisition”, these historical objects would have been destroyed in their native land.
To a certain extent, this could be the scenario as people of these countries experienced political turmoil and poverty; as such preservation of historical or archeological objects would be the last thing on their mind at that time.
However, things have improved, people of these places are better educated and understood the significance of conserving these historical artifacts.
It is not often that one reads news of events in or regarding Mongolia. In this case, the skeleton has brought that country to the front. How did it get shipped to Britain in the first place? For that whopping sum they sure thought about only their own pockets.
Personal greed and desire drives international traffickers to do what they for money for themselves. Did they stop to think for a moment to inform the local authorities about the initial finds of the dinosaur? They choose to keep the finds themselves, instead of having the skeletons being exhibited in a museum to benefit others more.