UNESCO convention, Fakes, and has everybody gone mad ?

[raeticus]

I know this is primarily a Roman military discussion. However I get through my military diploma interests increasingly emails from hopeful and naive buyers of such artefacts. And recently almost all are fake.

And the currently ongoing legislative effort in Germany to ratify the UNESCO convention makes all seem very unreal.

On one hand I hear that there will be substantial bureaucratic efforts to be made in the future for any item older than 100 (!) years and worth more than 1000€s. 100 years ??? My grandmothers used furniture is that old. And 1000€ ???? While everybody knows that the most important items are not always those most expensive (a small, commercially worthless, and rotten item in the right location may be most important). Is this making any sense at all ?

And then this flood of fakes everywhere. There may eventually just as many fakes covered by UNESCO as real stuff. Maybe a UNESCO certificate will even help selling fakes ?

And I wonder how many fakes have found their way into proper publications and distort our knowledge ?



Just for the fun of it, see some of the currently available artefacts. Of course no provenance ;-) )

a silver diploma !

[url:3qs1bqf4]http://cgi.ebay.com/295-Complete-Roman-silver-four-page-Legionary-diploma_W0QQitemZ300070628354QQihZ020QQcategoryZ37907QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem[/url]

another highly patinated diploma.
And look at all the other material this seller sold recently (look ie at the auction links of his feedback page)

[url:3qs1bqf4]http://cgi.ebay.com/ROMAN-BRONZE-MILITARY-DIPLOMA-OF-DISCHARGE-AND-CITIZEN_W0QQitemZ270081688105QQihZ017QQcategoryZ37907QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem[/url]

The top Roman gladiator sword on Ebay, Authenticity is absolutely guaranteed!!!!!!

[url:3qs1bqf4]http://cgi.ebay.com/FABULUOS-ROMAN-BRONZE-GLADIATORS-SHORT-SWORD-INTACT_W0QQitemZ270079841859QQihZ017QQcategoryZ37907QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem[/url]

We fly to the moon (if it was not all made up in Hollywood :-) ) ), but cannot control this ? Is this the Wild Wild west of our days ? Is there no law and no ethics left at all ?

[Andreas Gobinius]

Hi Raeticus,
It is very sad to say, that it is really the Wild West of our epoch of fully civilized man. Trade of archaeological items is restricted by the law in Poland but as I know from my work, unfortunately it is impossible to control eventual buyers and sellers. Some shops of antiquities have false documents for instance that all stuff they sell comes from private collections created before II World War. That is not restricted...
On the other hand even silver military diploma without context gives us much less information then it would be methodically excavated. But the fact is, that, if there is no buyer or seller of archaeological relics, there will be no problem with illegal explorations...

[Peroni]

The 'silver' diploma is an out -and-out copy of RMD-01 00035!

The seller says it's Trajanic too, the real one is actually Hadrianic!

Issued to Sepenesto, a Pannonian!

[Tarbicus]

How to report an item.

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/contact_us ... index.html

I'm about to do so.

Fraudulent listings
You suspect that a listing is fraudulent

[Peroni]

Been there - done that!

I also contacted the seller too.

[Tarbicus]

Reported by me as well.

[MARCvSVIBIvSMAvRINvS]

sale is still going..........

also, try to spam the seller with lots of complaints/questions through his e-mail.......

a Ddos attack is difficult if you dont have his X-originating IP

sadly so.......

M.VIB.M.