Abstract
Posing the question of what it means to " take back " involves not so much looking at restitution, which is the act of the one who gives back, as at the way works were taken back after an armed conflict in 1815 : how are they taken back, who takes them back, and under what conditions ?
An analysis of the correlations between military actions and the museum, and an exploration of the diplomatic stakes involved in the appropriation and restitution of objects confiscated since 1794, reveals that the first requests for the recovery of annexed heritage were made very early on by the European powers, but were almost systematically met with France's refusal to return what it considered to be its finest victory trophies.
While the entry of the coalition troops into Paris in 1814 could have paved the way for a rapid return of the works to their country of origin, the allied armies chose to leave the Louvre more or less intact, in exchange for a few secret arrangements.
The real turning point in the history of these collections came after the Hundred Days, when the anger aroused by Napoleon's return and the need to defeat him once again led the Prussians and the British to orchestrate, in the name of all spoliated states, a manu militari repossession of their respective cultural assets.
