Colombia calls for Madrid return ‘Quimbaya Treasure’

(ANSA) – BOGOTA, MAY 15 – The federal government of Colombia has formally requested Spain for the return of the Quimbaya Treasure, a group of 122 pre-Columbian archaeological items that have been donated to the European nation in 1893 and that are presently within the Museum of America in Madrid. The request, experiences the newspaper El Espectador, is contained in a letter despatched on Might 9 by the Colombian International Ministers, Luis Gilberto Murillo, and Tradition Ministers, Juan David Correa, to their Spanish counterparts. “The gathering consists of archaeological items (primarily ceramics and goldsmithery) related to the classical interval of Quimbaya, which have been looted by native guaqueros and delivered by the Colombian authorities to the Kingdom of Spain within the 12 months 1893, ignoring their cultural worth for our Nation “, the letter reads. The communication provides that the request is made “conscious of what it implies and recognizing the trouble that the Spanish authorities have made for its conservation and safety”. The request, it’s said, “is a part of worldwide fashions concerning the decolonization insurance policies of museums, the popularity of the cultural rights of peoples and the worldwide administration of cultural collections”. The 122 items of the Quimbaya Treasure belong to the pre-Columbian tradition of the central areas whose inhabitants was decimated through the Conquest till disappearing within the seventeenth century. The supply to Spain occurred shortly after the invention by the then Colombian president Carlos Holguín Mallarino, who thus meant to thank the Spanish Crown for the assistance obtained in a border dispute with Venezuela. (HANDLE).