# Partage: The Division That Was Legal
> Berlin's title to the Nefertiti bust rests on a document written by Egypt's own inspector on 20 January 1913. That single fact reshapes the whole restitution argument around it.
> The Study - 2026-08-27
> Canonical HTML: https://iconotheca.com/study/partage-the-division-that-was-legal/
## Key points
- Partage was not a loophole. It was the consideration in an excavation contract: the source state issued the licence, a private sponsor paid for the dig, and the finds were split between them at the end of the season.
- Berlin's title to the Nefertiti bust rests on a document rather than on possession. The Proces-Verbal du partage was written out by hand on 20 January 1913 by the Egyptian antiquities inspector Gustave Lefebvre and countersigned by Ludwig Borchardt.
- The division did not put the bust into a museum. It vested the German share in James Simon, the private sponsor, and the Berlin museums own the bust today because Simon gave it to them in 1920.
- The 2024 petition led by Zahi Hawass asks for the bust on the ground that it left Egypt illegally, and Hawass has said he is not seeking objects that left legally. That framing concedes the mechanism and attacks the particular division.
- At Begram the identical mechanism produced two halves that are both on public display, one in Kabul and one in Paris, and the Paris half is not commonly described as loot.
- Where no agreement existed, as at Benin in 1897, the legal argument is a different argument entirely. Conflating the two costs the claimant the stronger case and the holder the honest one.
## Partage was a payment, not a theft
## The Nefertiti bust was allotted on a signed document, and the document survives
## The division put the bust into private hands before any museum touched it
## Begram shows the same mechanism running to a calmer result
## The French half of Begram is in Paris and nobody calls it loot
## Where there was no agreement, the argument is a different argument
## How to read a partage line without flattering either side
Partage is the hardest category in restitution precisely because it is the one where the paperwork is in order. The instinct to describe every object that left a source state as looted is understandable, and it is strategically self-defeating: it invites the holder to produce a signed schedule and win the argument in public on a technicality that happens to be true. The stronger position is the narrow one, and Hawass has already taken it. Read the division, name the inspector, find the schedule, and argue about what was on it. Where the schedule cannot be produced at all, say so in the provenance and grade the link disputed, because a partage nobody can evidence is not a partage. It is a claim of one.
## Questions
**What does partage mean in archaeology?**
Partage is the division of excavated finds between the state that licensed an excavation and the party that funded it. It was standard practice for foreign digs in Egypt, Afghanistan and much of the Near East from the late nineteenth century, and the sponsor's share was the consideration for paying for the work.
**Was the Nefertiti bust legally exported from Egypt?**
The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation stated on 13 January 2023 that the documents prove the bust was legitimately awarded to the Berlin party in the 1913 division. Egypt's national committee, led by Zahi Hawass, asserts in its 2024 petition that the bust was removed illegally. The dispute turns on the conduct and terms of that one division rather than on whether partage in general transferred title.
**Who owned the Nefertiti bust before the Berlin museums?**
James Simon, the Berlin entrepreneur who was the sole sponsor of the Amarna excavation. By contract the German share of the 1913 division became his property, he kept the bust at his villa in Tiergartenstrasse, and he gave it with the rest of the Amarna finds to the Berlin museums in 1920.
**Why is a partage harder to reverse than a looting case?**
Because the instruments that reverse looting all depend on something having gone wrong when the object changed hands. Under a partage the transfer was the agreed purpose of the contract and the source state signed it, so a claimant has to attack the terms or conduct of that specific division rather than the fact of the transfer.
**Did the Begram hoard leave Afghanistan under a partage?**
Yes. The Musee Guimet records that under an agreement signed in 1922 between France and Afghanistan the Begram treasure was equally divided between the Guimet and the National Museum of Afghanistan, with Kabul retaining the unique and exceptional pieces. Both halves remain in public collections.
## Sources
- [1] Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Aegyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, 'The Find: Where was the bust of Nefertiti found?', section 'The Partage'. The holding museum's own account of the division of 20 January 1913, Gustave Lefebvre's Proces-Verbal du partage, the seven groups on each side, and James Simon's title and 1920 gift.
- [2] Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz, 'The History of the Finds: Nefertiti and the Pergamon Altar', official statement, 13 January 2023. The foundation's position that the division was documented and lawful and that title passed to James Simon.
- [3] Musee Guimet, collections page, 'Two female figures under a portico (Begram treasure)'. The museum's statement of the 1922 France-Afghanistan agreement, the equal division of the Begram treasure, and Kabul's retention of the unique and exceptional works.
- [4] Al Jazeera, 'Egyptian archaeologist urges German museum to return Nefertiti's bust', 8 September 2024. Zahi Hawass's petition, his statement that the bust was removed illegally, and his statement that he is not calling for the repatriation of artefacts taken out of Egypt legally.