Raided Ancient Egyptian ‘Green Coffin’ Came Back To Cairo By US

Egypt has received a plundered ancient Egyptian sarcophagus that was formerly on exhibit in a US museum.

The 2.9m (9.5ft) long “Green Coffin” belonged to a priest by the name of Ankhenmaat and is from the Late Dynastic Period, which lasted from 664 BC to 332 BC.

An international network of art smugglers stole it from the Abu Sir necropolis in northern Egypt and smuggled it into the US in 2008.

In 2013, a collector gave it on loan to the Houston Museum of Natural Science.

After a lengthy investigation that spanned several years, the sarcophagus was returned, and US ambassadors formally gave it over to Egypt on Monday during a ceremony. Sameh Shoukry, Egypt’s foreign minister, and Ahmed Issa, the country’s minister of tourism and antiquities, also attended the event.

According to Daniel Rubinstein, the US chargé d’affaires in Egypt, “Today’s ceremony is representative of the long history of cooperation between the United States and Egypt on antiquities protection and cultural heritage preservation.”

The repatriation of the sarcophagus, according to Mr. Issa, demonstrated Egypt’s arduous attempts to reclaim stolen artifacts.

The Green Coffin, which was worth over $1 million (£830,000), was allegedly transported out of Egypt by a global network of antiquities smugglers in September, according to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

The “Gold Coffin,” which was returned to Egypt in 2019, the Stele of Pa-di-Sena, which is also from the Late Dynastic Period and was given over in 2020, and five objects taken from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York last year were all trafficked by this network.

The recent return of antiquities to Egypt by other nations than the US is also common.

Israel turned up 95 artifacts that were either illegally brought into the country or discovered for sale in Jerusalem in 2021.

A university in the Republic of Ireland announced last month that it intended to return a sarcophagus, mummified human bones, and canopic jars to their home country.