Turkey’s cultural ambitions

土耳其的文化雄心

Of marbles and men

大理石和人

Turkey gets tough with foreign museums and launches a new culture war

土耳其对外国博物馆采取强硬态度，并发动一场新的文化战争

IN THE spring of 1887 a Lebanese villager named Mohammed Sherif discovered a well near Sidon that led to two underground chambers. These turned out to be a royal tomb containing 18 magnificent marble sarcophagi dating back to the fifth century BC. The Ottoman sultan, Abdul Hamid II, ordered the sarcophagi exhumed, placed on rails and carried down to the Mediterranean coast, where they were sent by ship to Istanbul. The largest sarcophagus was believed to contain the remains of Alexander the Great. The coffin is not Turkish and Sidon is now in Lebanon, but the sarcophagus is regarded as Istanbul’s grandest treasure, as important to the archaeology museum there as the “Mona Lisa” is to the Louvre.

1887年春，一个名叫穆罕默德·谢里夫的黎巴嫩村民在西顿附近发现一口通向两个地下室的井。这是一座建造于公元前五世纪的皇家墓室，里面有18尊雕刻精美庄严肃穆的大理石棺。奥斯曼帝国苏丹阿卜杜勒?哈米德二世下令发掘这些文物，它们被装上火车运到地中海沿岸，在那里这些石棺被装船运到伊斯坦布尔。人们相信最大的石棺里安放着亚历山大大帝的遗体。这些棺材不是土耳其的，而且西顿现在属于黎巴嫩，但是这些大理石棺被看做伊斯坦布尔最伟大的宝藏。考古博物馆对它们的重视，丝毫不亚于卢浮宫看重“蒙娜丽莎”。

The mildly Islamist government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, led by the Justice and Development (AK) party, likes to think of itself as the heir of the Ottoman sultans. The Turkish authorities have recently launched a wave of cultural expansionism, building new museums, repairing Ottoman remains, licensing fresh archaeological excavations and spending more on the arts. A grand museum in the capital, Ankara, is due to open in time for the centenary of the Turkish republic in 2023. “It will be the biggest museum in Turkey, one of the largest in Europe; an encyclopedic museum like the Metropolitan or the British Museum (BM),” boasts an aide to Ertugrul Gunay, the culture and tourism minister. “It’s his baby, his most precious project.”

伊斯兰正义发展党领导的温和伊斯兰政府（总理雷杰普?塔伊普?埃尔多安）喜欢以奥斯曼帝国苏丹的继承人自居。最近土耳其当局掀起一波文化扩张的浪潮，建造新的博物馆，修复奥斯曼时代的遗迹，准许新的考古发掘，在艺术方面加大投入。2023年首都安卡拉的一座雄伟的博物馆会向土耳其公众开放。“它会是土耳其最大的博物馆，是欧洲最大的博物馆之一，是类似于大都会艺术博物馆或大英博物馆的百科全书式的博物馆”文化旅游部部长图鲁尔?居纳伊的助手豪情满怀地说道，“这是他的孩子，是他最看重的工程。”

Turkey’s cultural plans at home are coupled with an unprecedentedly bold campaign to bring back treasures that it believes were stolen, which now sit in Western museums. These plans enjoy political support across the spectrum and the backing of all Turkey’s museum directors. The campaign targets many more objects and museums than the government has so far let on. “We are not waging a battle,” says Mr Gunay. “But this is definitely a struggle in the field of culture. And we are determined to boost our efforts in a more determined and more persistent way.”

土耳其国内的文化布局伴随着一场空前激烈的战斗，目的是要收回他们认为以前被盗走现在收藏于西方博物馆的珍品。这个计划得到了各阶层的政治支持并受到土耳其各个博物馆馆长的力挺。这场活动瞄准的文物和博物馆比迄今为止政府宣称的还要多。居纳伊说：“我们不是在发动战争，然而这的确是文化领域的斗争。我们将义无反顾，我们的努力将会更坚定，更持久。”

The Turkish authorities are using a mix of entreaty and threats to ensure they get what they want. They are refusing to lend treasures abroad, dragging their feet on licensing foreign archaeological digs and launching public campaigns they hope will shame Western museums.

土耳其当局用恳求和威胁的手段确保得到他们想要的东西。他们现在拒绝把文物借给外国，拖延颁发外国考古发掘的许可证，而且挑起了旨在让西方博物馆羞愧的公众运动。