An archaeologist’s quest to bring two Thai relics home

via Los Angeles Times, 26 March 2021: The stolen lintels found in San Francisco’s Asian Art Museum will return to Thailand later this month, this article from the LA Times features Thai archaeologist Tanongsak Hanwong and his role in their repatriation.

The intricately carved sandstone slab immediately caught the eye of archaeologist Tanongsak Hanwong.

He was conducting research for his doctorate at Burapha University in Thailand when he found an article about two Thai antiquities at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, one featuring the Hindu and Buddhist god Yama seated on a buffalo over a Kala monster face motif.

The image looked exactly like one he had studied in a college class decades ago, a black-and-white slide photographed in 1959 at Prasat Nong Hong, a temple in northeastern Thailand. Tanongsak remembered it because it was unique: Yama, lord of death, rarely decorated Khmer temples in Thailand.

A second architectural lintel also was found in the museum’s online records. Both came from temple sites that Thailand had registered in the mid-1930s as national ancient monuments. They were protected property.

Which raised the question: What were the two 1,500-pound stone lintels doing in an American art museum?

Source: An archaeologist’s quest to bring two Thai relics home – Los Angeles Times

See also:

• Ancient lintels coming home | Bangkok Post, 26 Mar 2021