Free Republic

PERU plans to sue Yale University to recover thousands of artefacts excavated from Machu Picchu more than 90 years ago. The South American country is seeking the return of some 4,900 artefacts from the Inca citadel, including ceramics, cloths and metalwork. Peru says they were lent to Yale for 18 months in 1916 but that the university in New Haven, Connecticut, has held on to them ever since. "Yale does not recognise the Peruvian state's ownership of these artefacts," Peru's ambassador to Washington, Eduardo Ferrero, said in a statement. He complained that after three years of talks, Yale officials were...

LIMA, Peru Peru is preparing a lawsuit against Yale University to retrieve artifacts taken nearly a century ago from the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu, a government official said Wednesday. Peru has held discussions in recent years with Yale seeking the return of nearly 5,000 artifacts, including ceramics and human bones that explorer Hiram Bingham dug up during three expeditions to Machu Picchu in 1911, 1912 and 1914. "Yale considers the collection university property, given the amount of time it has been there," said Luis Guillermo Lumbreras, chief of Peru's National Institute of Culture, in an interview with The Associated...