The office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has facilitated the return of 29 antiquities, collectively valued at $3m, to their rightful home in Greece. A ceremony was held earlier this month at the Consulate General of Greece in New York to mark the occasion and formally hand over the objects
The artefacts include pieces implicated in trafficking networks conducted by the smugglers Robin Symes and Eugene Alexander. Symes, a British art dealer who died in 2023, fell from grace after a 2016 probe by the Carabinieri, Italy's specialist art investigation squad, revealed him to be the ringleader of an international criminal looting syndicate that spanned decades.
“These 29 extraordinary pieces were recovered thanks to the hard work of our prosecutors and analysts,” Bragg in a statement. “The impact of these significant trafficking networks are still felt in New York, and we will continue to work alongside our partners around the globe to return stolen objects.”
Notable objects in the repatriated trove include a sculpture dubbed "Bronze Foot in the Form of a Sphinx", which actually might depict a siren; it was seized from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2025. Dating from the 600BC, a trafficker had sold it to Symes, who in turn sold it to a private collector who donated it to the Met in 2000.
Another piece, a bronze applique depicting a gorgon and dating from the 6th century BC, was originally attached to a bronze vessel. It depicts a running mythological female monster with snakes for hair, most popularly portrayed in modern day parlance through the story of Medusa. The bronze gorgon was sold by the trafficker Robert Hecht to Fortuna Fine Arts, a gallery that is currently battling fraud charges in federal court. Fortuna sold the applique to a private collector who then loaned the artefact to the Met, where it was seized by the Manhattan District Attorney's office's Antiquities Trafficking Unit earlier this year.
“Each repatriation of Greek antiquities is a profoundly important event, vindicating the Ministry of Culture’s policy in recent years,” Lina Mendoni, the Greek minister of culture, said in a statement. "Greece is now internationally recognised as a country that has placed the fight against illicit trafficking of cultural heritage at the forefront of its agenda—an issue directly linked to organised crime and terrorism.”
Since Bragg took office as Manhattan's District Attorney at the beginning of 2022, his office's Antiquities Trafficking Unit has recovered nearly 2,400 artefacts looted from 47 countries, worth a combined $260m. Earlier this year, his office returned eight artefacts to Peruvian authorities and assisted with the repatriation of three sculptural objects to Iraq.
