GREECE-TURKEY-ARCHAEOLOGY ©Image not from story. (Photo by ANGELOS TZORTZINIS/AFP via Getty Images)
The Trump administration handed Greece 26 looted antiquities during an event at the Greek Embassy in Washington, D.C., on April 23, officials said.
The haul was secured due to investigations by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) with support from ICE, the FBI and the State Department, according to an ICE press release. The collection features a 500-pound torso from a marble statue of Asclepius, the ancient Greek deity associated with medicine, dating to the 1st or 2nd century AD. Officials seized the torso after paperwork accompanying the piece allegedly turned out to be fraudulent. The haul also included 25 coins spanning the Greek, Roman and Byzantine/Eastern Roman eras. (RELATED: Researchers Unveil Ancient Conqueror’s Forgotten City In War-Torn Desert)
Among the most significant coins was a gold piece struck in Lampsakos, modern Turkey, around 370 BC, which a looter dug up and funneled through a middleman to the head of a criminal group for €7,000, according to ICE. It allegedly moved illegally from Greece to Germany and landed at a Philadelphia auction house. A bronze Macedonian coin from the same century, depicting Persephone and a hydra, allegedly traced back to the same criminal network. HSI Memphis also seized a silver didrachma minted in Rhodes, Greece, around 304 BC after the shipper could not prove the coin left Greece before import limitations took effect, officials said.
Interpol also assisted U.S. and Greek officials in returning two of the coins acquired by an alleged smuggling network, according to a Greek Ministry of Culture announcement. ICE Deputy Assistant Director Charles Wall issued a statement during the embassy event. “As someone who has learned the history of ancient Greece since I was a little kid in school, this repatriation means a lot to me … Today, [the items] are being returned to their homeland, ensuring their future is protected,” he said.
Greek Ambassador to the U.S. Antonis Alexandridis called the handover “a subtle but powerful victory of law, scientific inquiry, and moral clarity over forces that seek to fragment the past.”
Greek Culture Minister Lina Mendoni formally oversaw the transfer of the 26 items. She also held a discussion with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs Sherry Keneson Hall about a renewal of the countries’ bilateral Memorandum of Understanding on antiquities import rules, according to the Ministry of Culture. The renewal is anticipated to be finalized in September.
Since 2007, HSI’s Cultural Property, Art, and Antiquities program has returned more than 25,000 objects to over 40 nations, according to ICE. Greece alone has received upward of 200 items during that stretch.
Private American citizens also voluntarily donated 12 additional artifacts that the U.S. returned at the same ceremony, according to the Ministry of Culture.
Editor’s note: Article updated to clarify Interpol’s role in events.
