[smokingfrog]

Sometimes you wonder how even half this stuff could have survived until the present age. I guess even the evil treasure hunters have done us a favor once and a while.

[volunbeer]

I still wonder how many storage facilities for the Egyptian Antiquities Bureau were looted in the chaos.

[PapaBear3625]

Sometimes you wonder how even half this stuff could have survived until the present age. I guess even the evil treasure hunters have done us a favor once and a while.

If something is a valuable marketable item, there is an incentive to the owner to spend resources to ensure its preservation. Third world antiquities bureaucrat -- not so much.

[Safetgiver]

I met a nice guy in Paris in 1971 who was quite rich. I asked him what he did. He said “I smuggle antiquities from Egypt.” Isn’t that illegal? “They aren’t using them anymore.”