The coins were stored in a museum in Germany.
Thieves stole 483 Celtic coins from a museum in eastern Germany. According to Smithsonian magazine, the theft was carefully planned, and the value of the stolen coins is estimated at 1.7 million dollars.
The coins were found in 1999 during the excavations of a settlement located near modern Munching in Bavaria. They date back to approximately 100 BC. e. and were exhibited in the Celtic and Roman Museum in Manching.
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“The hoard is still considered the largest cache of ancient Celtic gold discovered in the 20th century, and it remains a mystery why so much gold was kept in one place and how it ended up there,” wrote Christopher F. Schütze of the New York Times.
To commit the theft, the thieves dismantled the cables at the telecommunications facility, leaving about 1,000 subscribers without connection. The police believed that local banks were the target of the attackers, and sent additional patrols to them. Law enforcement officers note that they are dealing with organized crime, since “you can't just walk into a museum and take coins,” which are well protected.
This is not the first case of large-scale theft in recent years in Germany. So, in 2017, robbers stole one of the world's largest gold coins from Berlin's Bode Museum. The Canadian coin, known as the Big Maple Leaf, weighs almost 221 pounds (100 kilograms) and is made of 99.999% pure gold. In 2020, three men were sentenced to prison for organizing a robbery, and the fourth was acquitted. Since then, no one has seen the coin. The authorities believe that it was melted down and sold.
In 2019, thieves committed “one of the largest jewelry thefts in history”, stealing valuables worth more than 100 million dollars from the Green Vaults museum in Dresden.
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Then 18th-century diamonds, a royal pearl necklace, a diamond Polish Order of the White Eagle, pendants and breast ornaments were taken out of the museum. Four robbers entered through the window, having previously turned off the electricity and signaling.
