Egypt says 36 antiquities illegally removed to the United States have been recovered and returned. The items arrived in three groups: 11 from the New York State Attorney General (including a Roman-era mummy mask), 24 rare Coptic and Syriac manuscripts from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a painted 18th Dynasty plaster panel. An archaeological committee will conserve and restore the pieces before displaying them at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Egyptian officials say they monitor online marketplaces and work with international partners to recover smuggled heritage.
Egypt Reclaims 36 Stolen Antiquities from the U.S.; Rare Manuscripts and 3,000‑Year‑Old Panel Head Home
Egypt says 36 antiquities illegally removed to the United States have been recovered and returned. The items arrived in three groups: 11 from the New York State Attorney General (including a Roman-era mummy mask), 24 rare Coptic and Syriac manuscripts from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a painted 18th Dynasty plaster panel. An archaeological committee will conserve and restore the pieces before displaying them at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Egyptian officials say they monitor online marketplaces and work with international partners to recover smuggled heritage.
01:34, 07.11.2025Culture
Cairo — 36 historic Egyptian artifacts returned from the United States
Egypt's Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities announced Thursday that 36 historical artifacts illegally removed from the country have been repatriated from the United States with the cooperation of U.S. authorities. The items arrived in Egypt about two weeks ago, the ministry's media adviser Nevine El-Aref told CBS News.
The recovered objects came in three main groups. The first group, provided by the New York State Attorney General's office, includes 11 pieces such as a Roman-era mummy burial mask belonging to a young man, a vessel shaped like the protective dwarf-god Bes, and a limestone funerary stela—an inscribed tablet—from the Roman period.
In a related development in May, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg Jr. said his office had returned 11 antiquities to the people of Egypt after those items were identified during multiple criminal investigations. "Eleven more priceless antiquities have now been recovered and returned to where they rightfully belong," Bragg said at the time.
The second group was handed over by the Metropolitan Museum of Art to the Egyptian Consulate in New York and comprises 24 rare manuscripts written in the ancient Coptic and Syriac languages. The third group consists of a painted plaster panel from Egypt's 18th Dynasty—roughly 3,000 years old—which the New York State Attorney General's office confiscated after determining it had been removed illegally.
Nevine El-Aref: "Any artifact that belongs to Egypt's heritage is important. Even if it's a small stone, it is important to bring it back to Egypt, where it belongs. It is very important for Egypt to preserve its archaeological heritage and its history and pass it on to the next generations."
An archaeological committee has received the returned pieces. The ministry said the objects will undergo conservation and restoration before being displayed at the Egyptian Museum in central Cairo.
El-Aref added that Egyptian authorities continuously monitor online marketplaces and cooperate with international partners whenever suspected smuggled antiquities surface. Separately, the prime minister of the Netherlands recently announced his country would return a stolen 3,500-year-old sculpture to Egypt following his attendance at the Grand Egyptian Museum's official opening on November 1.