On November 3, English auction house Bonhams issued a public statement saying it decided to call off its auction (originally set for Nov 8) of two cultural relics that belonged to Yuanmingyuan, the Chinese imperial garden built in 1707 during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).
This sets a precedent for foreign auction houses canceling their auction of Chinese cultural relics.
Countries with long histories like Egypt and China take pride in their rich cultural heritage, but must accept the sad and painful fact that many of their rare cultural relics, symbols of a once splendid, ancient civilization, now do not actually belong to them.
Some experts argue ancient relics should be presented in their country of origin. "Cultural relics reflect history, and only when they are integrated with the country that owns them can they embody historic and educational significance," said Zhao Yu, a councilman at the Cultural Relic Academy of China.
"China has lost millions of first and second-level cultural relics to other countries," said Zhao.
Withdrawn from auction
The birth certificate of those two pieces on Bonhams' website clearly stated they were "taken out" by a British soldier in 1860, the year of the savage looting and burning of Yuanmingyuan by the coalition army of Britain and France.
In its statement, Bonhams explained that the move is meant to avoid stimulating Chinese people's indignation. The move came in response to public outcry over the proposed auction as seen in Chinese media. And this is not the first time Chinese people have expressed their strong objections to the auctioning of Yuanmingyuan cultural relics by foreign owned houses.
In 2000, Sotheby's in Hong Kong (HK) and Christie's in HK auctioned three bronze heads of Chinese zodiac animals. The 12 symbolic creatures were sculpted in the reign of Emperor Qianlong during the Qing Dynasty.
"The State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH) issued a letter requesting that they stop the auction, but (their requests) were ignored," said Zhao. "The same situation happened in 2009 when Christie's in Paris auctioned another Chinese zodiac animal head," he said.
After two failed requests, the Chinese government responded by closing the doors of the auction previews at both auction houses in the mainland. Foreign auction houses are not allowed to hold auctions alone in the mainland, but now Sotheby's and Christie's suffer the further restriction of being forbidden to preview items in the region.
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