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James Delingpole

Give thanks for the imperialist ‘tomb raiders’

Without them, many of the artefacts now demanded back from museums simply wouldn’t have survived

9 April 2016

9:00 AM

9 April 2016

9:00 AM

If ever you find yourself in Berlin, there are three places you absolutely must visit. The first two are museums: the Neues Museum, to see the well-worth-the-detour head of Nefertiti; and the Pergamon Museum, so you can offer up a prayer of gratitude for the arrogance of all those 19th-century imperialist looters who understood that the treasures of classical antiquity are far too precious to be wasted on the barbarous cultures which, by geographical accident, have inherited them since.

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