What do an obelisk, a column, a grave marker, and a temple all have in common? They are all archaeological ambassadors. Other nations presented these four extraordinary archaeological monuments and objects to New York as gifts over the last 145 years. Egypt gave Cleopatra’s Needle (now in Central Park) and the Temple of Dendur (now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art) to New York City and the United States of America respectively. Greece presented a funerary stele, christened “the Marathon Stone,” as a gift to City College. Now displayed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, it once had pride of place in the now-demolished Lewisohn Stadium. In conjunction with its pavilion at the 1964/65 World’s Fair, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan presented a column from Jerash to the city of New York. It still stands near the Unisphere in Flushing Meadows Corona Park. These remarkable monuments are hiding in plain sight all over New York City. While the Statue of Liberty may be the most famous gift bestowed upon New York City, these monuments and artifacts tell a curious story of how antiquities can function as tools of cultural diplomacy. To learn more about this project, please follow my Instagram and keep eye out for my book on this subject (under contract with Palgrave MacMillan).
