In a significant gesture of cultural restitution, a private foreign collector has voluntarily returned 86 Greek antiquities to Greece following an agreement with the Ministry of Culture. The artifacts, spanning millennia of history, were handed over in what officials describe as an exemplary act of cooperation and respect for cultural heritage.
The collection covers an impressive chronological spectrum, from the Early Neolithic to the Late Hellenistic period. Among the treasures are naturalistic female figurines from the Neolithic era, marble figurines and vessels of the Early Cycladic period, Mycenaean ceramics, and bronze figurines from the Geometric, Archaic, and Hellenistic periods.
Also included are bronze helmets of various types, bronze and silver vessels, bronze mirrors, fine examples of Attic black-figure and red-figure pottery, a marble funerary stele, terracotta figurines, and golden funerary wreaths dating to the Hellenistic age.
Minister of Culture Lina Mendoni welcomed the return, noting:
“I hope this example inspires other collectors of Greek antiquities to follow suit, working with us to return their collections to their rightful home. For Greece and the Ministry of Culture, every repatriation—especially voluntary ones—proves that more and more people around the world now recognize the necessity of returning cultural assets to their countries of origin.”
Once the documentation and cataloguing process is complete, the antiquities will be distributed to museums across the country, ensuring that the public can once again engage with these artifacts in their proper cultural context.
