NEW YORK – The Manhattan District Attorney announced that a US billionaire has surrendered 180 stolen antiquities as part of a deal that ends further investigation by a grand jury into his affairs. The artwork is valued at over $70 million USD.
Michael Steinhardt, 81, an American billionaire, a former hedge fund manager, and founder of the Steinhardt Foundation for Jewish Life, denies criminal wrongdoing in the matter.
The agreement with the District Attorney ends a multi-year investigation into Steinhardt’s activities and bans Steinhardt from collecting historical relics for the rest of his life. Steinhardt’s agreement to surrender the artifacts also means that the antiquities will no longer be held as evidence for a “grand-jury indictment, trial, potential conviction and sentence.”
Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, Jr. alleges that Steinhardt’s seized antiquities had been looted from 11 countries and then smuggled out via 12 criminal networks. The District Attorney said that the antiquities lacked verifiable provenance prior to their arrival in the international art market.
“For decades, Michael Steinhardt displayed a rapacious appetite for plundered artifacts without concern for the legality of his actions, the legitimacy of the pieces he bought and sold, or the grievous cultural damage he wrought across the globe,” District Attorney Vance said in a statement.
“His pursuit of ‘new’ additions to showcase and sell knew no geographic or moral boundaries, as reflected in the sprawling underworld of antiquities traffickers, crime bosses, money launderers, and tomb raiders he relied upon to expand his collection,” he added.
Stag’s Head Rhyton Credit: Manhattan District Attorney’s Office
The District Attorney’s office said their case brought together their Antiquities Tracking Unit in partnership with Homeland Security Investigations (HIS) and international law enforcement authorities.
“Steinhardt viewed these precious artifacts as simple commodities – things to collect and own. He failed to respect that these treasures represent the heritage of cultures around the world from which these items were looted, often during times of strife and unrest,” said HSI New York Acting Special Agent in Charge Ricky J. Patel. “The outstanding collaboration between the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and Homeland Security Investigations revealed the breadth of Steinhardt’s plundering and this collaborative effort has yielded the remarkable results announced today.”
“Mr. Steinhardt is pleased that the District Attorney’s years-long investigation has concluded without any charges, and that items wrongfully taken by others will be returned to their native countries,” attorneys for Steinhardt, Andrew J. Levander and Theodore V. Wells Jr., said in a statement.
Among the items surrendered was a large Stag’s Head Rhyton. Rhyta are conical metal containers similar to drinking horns that were typically formed in the shape of an animal’s head. They were used throughout Eurasia and especially Persia. Some rhyta were used in ceremonies and rituals; others were used by nobility.
Items recovered from the Steinhardt collection include a larnax (left), death mask (center), and Stag’s Head Rhyton (right) Credit: Manhattan District Attorney
The Stag’s Head Rhyton dates to 400 BCE and appeared after looting in Milas, Turkey. It was purchased from The Merrin Gallery for US$2.6 million in November 1991 and is valued at about US$3.5 million today. Steinhardt had loaned the rhyton to the Met in 1993, where it remained until the District Attorney’s office applied for a warrant.
Another object surrendered was a larnax, a funerary object from the Greek Island of Crete that dates between 1400-1200 BCE and is valued at about $1 million USD.
Larnakes are small coffins or ash chests that were used for human remains in the Minoan civilization and in Ancient Greece. Bodies were either bent or cremated to fit in the vessel.
The District Attorney said that “While complaining about a subpoena requesting provenance documentation for a different stolen antiquity, Steinhardt pointed to the Larnax and said to an investigator with A.T.U.[Antiquities Trafficking Unit]: ‘You see this piece? There’s no provenance for it. If I see a piece and I like it, then I buy it.’”
Larnax Credit: Manhattan District Attorney’s Office
Other pieces surrendered included three death masks dating to 6000 to 7000 BCE and crafted from stone that originated in the Judean mountains, a gold bowl with a scalloped flower design looted from Nimrud, Iraq, and trafficked while the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant controlled the region and the Ercolano Fresco that shows Hercules strangling a snake and was looted from a Roman villa in the ruins of Herculaneum near Naples, Italy.
District Attorney Vance Jr. said, “this agreement guarantees that 180 pieces will be returned expeditiously to their rightful owners in 11 countries.”
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit has recovered several thousand stolen antiquities returning over 1,500 priceless artifacts to their rightful owners and repatriated to their countries of origin, including a total of 717 objects to 14 nations since August 2020.
Among those artifacts is a Roman mosaic from the Ships of Nemi, that was recently found and returned. The remaining artifacts are still being held as they are evidence in future trials or waiting to be repatriated but delayed by the pandemic.
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