NEW YORK. Investigators have seized in the last six months at the Met, Metropolitan Museum in New York, 27 ancient works of art worth 13 million dollars, purchased by the prestigious museum to show the glory of ancient Rome, Greece and Egypt, but believed to be the result of looting. Of these 21 are Italian, for an estimated value of 10 million dollars, while six are Egyptian (3.2 million). The New York Times. They will be returned to their countries of origin with a ceremony scheduled for next week.
Some of these objects – the NYT writes – have passed through the hands of people long suspected of having trafficked antiquities, such as Gianfranco Becchina, who ran a gallery in Switzerland for decades before being investigated in Italy in 2001 for illegal operations. But most of the works entered the Met’s collection well before Becchina was indicted.
The museum explained that information on the Italian objects has only recently been made available by investigators from the New York district attorney and that it has fully collaborated with authorities, ensuring that examination of the acquisitions has become more rigorous over the past 20 years. One of the most valuable items is a 470 BC terracotta drinking cup, valued at $ 1.2 million, brought directly from the Becchina gallery in 1979. Another work, a terracotta statuette of a Greek deity from 400 BC is a gift made in 2000 by Robin Symes, a British antiquarian involved in the sale of a giant statue of Aphrodite purchased in 1998 by the Getty Museum for 18 million dollars and then returned to Italy in 2007.