Looted Art Displayed At Met Museum Is Returned To Native Libya

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — Two sculptures that had been looted from an ancient Libyan city — including one that was on display for decades at the Metropolitan Museum of Art — were returned to their homeland on Wednesday following an investigation by Manhattan prosecutors.

The two antiquities, "Veiled Head of a Lady" and "Bust of a Bearded Man," had originated in Cyrene, Libya, an Ancient Greek and Roman city near the Mediterranean coast. In the 1980s and '90s, the city was looted, and the two artworks — valued at more than $500,000 — appeared on the international art market soon after, prosecutors said.

The woman's bust, dating to roughly 350 B.C., had been stolen from a tomb in Cyrene, smuggled into Egypt by a known antiquities trafficker, and then shipped to New York, where it went on display at the Met starting in 1998, prosecutors said.

It remained there until February, when it was seized by prosecutors, according to a spokesperson for the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. The museum cooperated after prosecutors presented evidence of its origins, the spokesperson said.

The male bust, meanwhile, was created between the second and fourth centuries, looted from a tomb in Cyrene, and then smuggled to Geneva, Switzerland, according to prosecutors. It later arrived in Manhattan, where it remained on the art market before being seized in March, prosecutors said.

Both items were returned to the Libyan people on Wednesday in a ceremony attended by diplomats from the U.S. and Libya.

"These are more than just beautiful artifacts – they are windows into thousands of years of culture and deserve to be returned to their country of origin,” Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg said in a statement.

“Manhattan is home to some of the most prized art and history pieces in the entire world, but they must be acquired legally."

At least one of the objects will go on display at a museum in the present-day town of Shahat, near the site of Cyrene, according to a statement by Khaled Daief, Charge d’Affaires of the Embassy of Libya.

Through its Antiquities Trafficking Unit, the Manhattan D.A.'s office has seized more than 3,000 looted artifacts in recent years.