By Glenn Maffia

I could not quite comprehend the immense gravity of the deed, the sheer betrayal of our most intimate trust, or merely the sheer depths to which we, as a nation, have sunk.

And this emanating from one of the bastions of dignity entrenched within the fabric of societal values that have seemingly stood for an eternity. The discovery of recent ‘insider’ thefts from the long-respected and esteemed British Museum.

Upon reflection the image has been creaking and groaning for many, many decades. The gaps created by the cracks in the façade ever widening as each passing year was passed with the chiming of Big Ben. No more is solid, there are no rocks to cling to. Our certainties have been dismantled.

Is anywhere sacrosanct?

This perverse deceit has resonations that shall reverberate globally throughout the academic world. For if such criminality could occur in such a renowned institution, as something as staid and solid as the British Museum, then is nowhere sacrosanct?

We are speaking about the area of Bloomsbury, no less. One could not envisage a more genteel, eminently respectable place of residence. We are not down at Wapping Docks in the East End (once notorious for its pilfering).

We have seen so many institutions fall and crumble in recent years. Icons, or symbols of declaring a solid foundation smashed asunder by the greedy and foolish folly of, ultimately, basic charlatans whose values are warped.

We have descended into a dog-eat-dog fight of attrition. Where cheating, deception, illusions and lies are the tools of the trade. It is now the norm to employ those heartless lies to deceive and distress.

Unceremoniously jettisoned

I feel crest-fallen, bereft of the substance which sustained me. The British Museum was one such institution that could thus nourish my aspirations. The Roman historian, Tacitus, once commented that, “the Romans create a desolation and call it peace”.

Now I forlornly observe the injurious carnage wrought by nothing more than petty, avoidable, theft. All high ambitions unceremoniously dumped in the vile gutter of ‘modernity’, free market entrepreneurship and the old callous game of blatant coercion supported by dubious statistics.

A safe haven, no more

Upon reading this upsetting news I did quip that, “many people are of the persuasion that all the artefacts in the BM are, by virtue of being precisely there, already stolen items”.

Their collection spans the globe, some say of colonialism, though I have preferred to believe one of caretakers of worldwide historic artefacts.

We continually hear, read and see upon our TV screens to this very day the annihilating destruction of jewels of humanity within all corners of the globe. If you like, a cultural pandemic.

The British Museum, to me, was a lifeboat, a saviour, of our collected human past. Somewhere solid with impeccable credentials to serve all nations of the world and care for treasures that in all probability would, have long since vanished, whether that be through malice, jealously or sheer uneducated unadulterated indifference.

That was once a valid point from which to argue. Though, is such a stance tenable now, after this disgraceful fiasco? If the British Museum cannot safely secure the artefacts under its care then what is the point of it. All credibility evaporates. All prestige floundering in the mire of cheap criminality.