# James Simon transfers the Nefertiti bust to the Berlin museums

Date: 1920

## The fact

In 1920 James Simon, the excavation’s financier, transferred the bust to the Berlin museums, converting a privately held find into a public-collection object under German museum law. The transfer is a completed legal instrument. It is not an Egyptian export licence and not the 1912 pit.

## Context

Without Simon’s money the 1912 season does not run as it did. Without the transfer the object could have remained private. Public title in Berlin is why later restitution has a state counterpart rather than an heir.

[Nefertiti](/people/nefertiti) is not the sole author of every later object, law, or museum label that uses the name. Shared work with courts, excavators, printers, spouses, officials, and later states does not erase a documented role, and it does not make an ancient person the signer of a twentieth-century statute.

## Evidence and sources

SMB institutional history and Britannica independently note Simon’s role and the museum holding.

Official or archival record: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin — Neues Museum (https://www.smb.museum/en/museums-institutions/neues-museum/home.html; SMB / Neues Museum).

## Significance

Public-collection access path. High confidence on the transfer. Colonial legality of the prior export is a separate Fact.

A public museum title can be both an access good and the thing Egypt later sues in politics. Split the rows.

## What is established and what is not

Established: Simon transferred the bust to Berlin museums around 1920. Not established: that Egypt consented in 1920 to perpetual title.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date or name, or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of later institutions.

The date is the date of this instrument, not a licence to back-date every later harm or benefit.

## People

- Nefertiti: https://factrail.ai/people/nefertiti

## Drivers

- Digital Learning Access: https://factrail.ai/drivers/edu-digital-learning-access

## Sources

- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nefertiti
- https://www.smb.museum/en/museums-institutions/neues-museum/home.html

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/de-james-simon-donates-bust-1920