Puglia recovers other archaeological treasures. After the operation that last year brought the sculptural group of Orpheus and the Sirens to Taranto, today exhibited in a room dedicated to the MarTa, it could be the prestigious Ionian museum that hosts 25 finds – including 14 precious vases and 10 plates – which were exhibited at the Altem Museum in Berlin.
The operation was made possible by an agreement signed in the German capital between our Minister of Culture, Gennaro Sangiuliano, the German Minister of Culture, Claudia Roth, and the Italian ambassador to Berlin, Armando Varricchio. The agreement provides for the return of 25 objects of Italian origin belonging to the Foundation for the Cultural Heritage of Prussia (SPK) chaired by Hermann Parzinger and currently exhibited at the Altes Museum in the section of the collection of classical antiquities.
The agreement is the result of close collaboration between the Italian and German Ministries of Culture, the Foundation and the Berlin Museum in the evaluation and provenance operations of cultural assets resulting from illegal excavations or robberies, tracing the path of the archaeological collections, from the discovery upon their entry into the exhibition sites. Thanks to the agreement, strongly supported by Minister Sangiuliano, a precious funerary object of Appula origin will soon return to Italy, consisting of 14 vases and ten decorated plates, as well as a fragment of a fresco from a villa in Boscoreale. The funerary objects were included in the list of goods stolen by the well-known art trafficker Giacomo Medici, convicted in 2009 for illicit trafficking of cultural goods. According to investigations, it was first acquired by a Swiss family (Cramer collection) and then resold by an antiquities dealer, a certain Christopher Leon, to the Altes Museum for 3 million marks in 1984.
On 21 of the 25 finds, the competent judicial authorities (the Public Prosecutor’s Offices of Rome and Foggia, the latter represented at the ceremony by Deputy Prosecutor Rosa Pensa) have opened legal proceedings, following investigations by the Carabinieri for the Protection of Cultural Heritage and issued confiscation measures. So far, the German judicial authority has refused to execute the decrees issued by the Rome prosecutor’s office for failure to respect the Altes Museum’s right to defence, as it was not given the opportunity to participate in the hearing which determined the confiscation decree. Given the desire of the Prussian Museum Foundation to return the finds, a collaboration agreement was also negotiated which, on the model of agreements signed with other foreign museums, provides, in exchange for the restitution, a loan for four years (renewable once) of some finds at the German museum, two of which come from the National Archaeological Museum of Naples and two from the Archaeological Parks of Paestum and Velia.
«These are archaeological finds that experts consider to be of great importance. We conducted intense diplomatic work to bring them back to Italy. I thank the German government for respecting the rules. We will continue to work to bring back to our homeland what has illicitly ended up abroad”, said Sangiuliano. For Minister Roth «this repatriation is a clear example of the effectiveness of the protection of cultural heritage in Germany and in Europe. What today’s repatriation highlights is the profound meaning of protection, that is, identifying and protecting cultural assets that come from looting, robberies, smuggling and illegal excavations. Equally important is the close collaboration between Germany and Italy in this field: so far no other country has received as many returns of illegally traded cultural goods as Italy.”
“The signing of the agreement with the SPZ is an example for cultural diplomacy and has demonstrated how the cooperative work of the institutions of both countries was necessary for the protection and enhancement of our cultural heritage”, added the secretary general of the Ministry of Culture, Mario Turetta, signatory of the agreement for the ministry.
The location to host the collection has not yet been decided. There are two possibilities: in addition to the very prestigious National Archaeological Museum of Taranto, already home to finds of inestimable value from the Greek and Roman eras, the Swabian castle of Bari is also in pole position. In the coming weeks, reservations regarding the destination of the treasure will be resolved. , incredible and wonderful testimony to the history of the people of Puglia.
