Staff at the Roman-Celtic Museum in the Bavarian town of Manching discovered that 450 Celtic coins worth millions of euros were looted from a display case early Tuesday morning.
“The facade was broken,” local police reported, though investigators offered few additional clues as to who or what might be behind the alleged theft, AFP reports.
The coins were the museum’s masterpiece. The investigation is led by specialists from the Bavarian Criminal Police.
“The loss of Celtic treasure is a disaster, and as a testament to our history, gold coins are irreplaceable,” said Bavarian Minister of Science and Arts Markus Bloem.
Cut off the phone and the Internet at the time of theft
The authorities were quick to notice a breakdown in telephone and internet services at the time.
Mayor Herbert Nerb told the German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung“They cut off the whole of Mansheng.”
“The museum is actually a heavily guarded site. But all contact with the police was cut off.”
Nerab said the looting of 450 coins was a “total disaster” for his town.
The pieces were discovered in 1999 but date back to the third century BC.
Another high level heist
The theft is the latest in a string of high-profile museum thefts in Germany.
The royal palace in Dresden was battered by looters in 2019 who quickly launched a daring raid on the Green Vault Museum. The value of the theft was at least 113.8 million euros ($117 million).
en / jcg (AFP, dpa)
