What would Indy have said? The Elgin Marbles. Indeed, major national museum collections, from the British Museum to the Louvre were founded on this very belief – but, in a post-colonial world, this attitude has become hotly contested. It reinforces the idea that Western academics have a right to excavate and display the world’s cultural treasures. This quote, from The Last Crusade, possibly is the most famous line spoken by Indy – and the most problematic for archaeologists and museums. Despite popular iconography – the fangs, red eyes and penchant for blood – this Hindu goddess is generally revered as more than just a destroyer and is a rather more nuanced force than the one represented in the film. The film’s mistreatment of Kali is rather more obvious, however. The Thuggees, led in the film by the sinister Mola Ram, were a notorious criminal fraternity, suppressed by the British in colonial India. 3) The Thuggees and the cult of KaliĪ rather strange mish-mash of ideas in the Temple of Doom did have some basis in fact, although very loosely interpreted. So Indiana Jones fighting Nazis is an honourable and historically accurate portrayal, even if the modern battleground against nationalist pseudo-archaeology has now shifted to Twitter. Kossinna based it on the supposed presence of Germanic peoples there during prehistory, and while he died before Hitler came to power, he was active while the territorial negotiations at the Versailles conference after World War I were taking place. Perhaps most telling are the works of Gustaf Kossinna, whose book German Prehistory: A Pre-eminently National Discipline set out the archaeological justification for the annexation of Poland. Nazi research missions under the guise of the Ahnenerbe were dispatched to a surprising variety of places in order to “demonstrate” the influence of Aryan migrants in prehistory, including Poland, the Andes and Tibet. For the Nazis, archaeology was central to “proving” their arguments for Aryan superiority. Nazis were the villains of both Raiders of The Lost Ark and The Last Crusade, which again isn’t far from the truth.
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