With its flowing robes and stoic posture, the larger-than-life bronze statue believed to represent the great Roman statesman Marcus Aurelius had, since 1986, held pride of place in the Greek and Roman galleries at the Cleveland Museum of Art.
Now the statue is off display, seized under a warrant earlier this month by the Manhattan district attorney’s office.
The office said on Thursday that the seizure was related to an “ongoing criminal investigation into a smuggling network involving antiquities looted from Turkey and trafficked through Manhattan.”In their warrant, investigators put the value of the statue, which is headless, at $20 million, and said it was about 1,800 years old.
They said it would be transported to New York in September.
According to the district attorney’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit, the accused traffickers were based in New York, giving the unit legal authority to seize the statue from another state because New York was the “focal point of the conspiracy.” Officials would not elaborate on the case.
Persons:
Marcus Aurelius
Organizations:
Cleveland Museum of Art, ”, Trafficking
Locations:
Manhattan, Turkey, New York