TWO carved stone relics that are more than 1,000 years old were repatriated by the United States to China last week.

During a ceremony at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, Huang Ping, consul general of China in New York City, signed the repatriation agreement and received the two relics on behalf of China’s National Cultural Heritage Administration.

The two artifacts are stone funerary beds with carved, decorative patterns. Dating to a period between the Southern and Northern Dynasties (420-581) and the Tang Dynasty (618-907), the relics are of high historical, scientific and artistic value, according to a statement by the cultural heritage administration.

Wang Sikang, an archaeologist specializing in ancient Chinese art, said that funerary platforms resembled stone beds and were often composed of a stone slab and surrounding stone screens that resembled the wooden folding screens that ancient Chinese would often have in their bedrooms.

Wang noted that these ancient stone screens would often be engraved with intricate decorations such as figures and animals. Such decorations hold archaeological and cultural significance as they provide insight not only into the burial customs but also the beliefs and lives of people at the time.

“The ancient designs show what the people of the Northern to Tang dynasties wore and what they through of as beautiful. The returned relic shed light on Tang Dynasty art,” Wang said, adding that China has many relics that are still lost overseas. Returning these historical pieces to China can “help the world archaeology better understand ancient Chinese history.”

The relics were seized this year by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and U.S. Homeland Security Investigations as part of a criminal case. China’s National Cultural Heritage Administration cooperated with the U.S. side to launch the repatriation process in April.

Huang said at the ceremony that the repatriation demonstrated the close cooperation between China and the U.S. in cultural relic protection. Such cooperation was beneficial for mutual understanding and friendship between the people of the two countries, and it added positive energy to the bilateral relations, he said.

The repatriation set an example for international cooperation in cracking down on the illicit trafficking of cultural relics and on protecting such relics, and it demonstrated enhanced intergovernmental cooperation, he said. It will also improve the international community’s awareness about protecting the shared cultural heritage of mankind.

Lisa Del Pizzo, who represented the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, said at the ceremony that it was the second time since 2021 that her office had cooperated with China on the repatriation of cultural relics. Del Pizzo said she expected the repatriation to send a clear signal that China and the U.S. would continue active collaboration in the investigation, retrieval and return of stolen cultural relics.

From 1998 until the office’s seizure in 2023, the antiquities were on loan to the Metropolitan Museum of Art from a private collector based in Manhattan. In early 2023, the office concluded a criminal investigation into relics purchased by the collector, resulting in the seizure of 89 antiquities from 10 countries.

Since 2015, the U.S. has returned a total of 404 cultural relics and artworks and one paleontological fossil to China.

(Global Times, China Daily)