Flemish premier Jan Jambon (Flemish nationalist/N-VA), who also doubles as the Flemish culture minister, has returned three valuable Celtic bracelets to Romania. The bracelets were dug up illegally and auctioned in Monaco. The sellers claimed the artefacts had been found in a ditch in Houtem in West Flanders.
The two bracelets date from around a thousand years BCE. In 2020 they suddenly surfaced at an auction in Monaco, where they were valued at some 180,000 euros.
The seller claimed that the two artefacts had been found in a ditch near a house in Houtem (West Flanders), but that was a cock-and-bull story.
PM Jan Jambon: “The experts immediately smelled a rat because art like this has never been recovered from so far west in the continent of Europe. To ensure the bracelets could not be sold we immediately added them to the Flemish top items list”.
Items featured on the list are the subject of restrictions when it comes to sale and export. The Flemish government introduced the list to protect mobile items of exceptional culture value and ensure that rare and unique items and collections cannot be lost to Flanders.
An investigation revealed that the bracelets had been dug up in Romania illegally. A third bracelet was discovered during a house search at the seller’s home. The seller claimed he had obtained the bracelets as part of a barter in return for an antique hunting rifle.
“The Romanians are so thrilled they have been returned” PM Jambon said during the handover ceremony at the MAS Museum on the River up in Antwerp. “I just hope that when something identical occurs with Flemish artefacts abroad the same will happen” Mr Jambon laughed.