Antiquities detectives in New York have recovered two rare ancient coins smuggled out of Israel, which will be returned home, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced on Wednesday. They aren’t on a plane yet but will be at some point thanks to a massive joint effort by the Israel Antiquities Authority with the Antiquities Trafficking Unit at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and Homeland Security.
Grave robbery is the bane of the archaeologist, because artifacts stolen and hidden disappear from the record forevermore. The thieves are not destroying ancient tombs and palaces in order to leer over antiquities in the privacy of their homes. Rather, they aim to sell them on the black market to immoral or ignorant private collectors and incautious museums.
The dimensions of the trade by nature unknowable. A 2023 Cambridge study concluded that press reports claiming that the antiquities black market was the third largest global industry after arms and drugs were mindlessly repeating a false narrative.
Ilan Hadad, head of the antiquities commerce division at the Israel Antiquities Authority’s Theft Prevention Unit, agrees – global antiquities theft is the fourth-biggest industry after arms, drugs and human trafficking, he claims. The fact is that the IAA’s theft prevention division is kept extremely busy. Occasionally the guilt-ridden heir of a wealthy collector returns a stolen treasure to the public. At times, the police catch the miscreants, justice is done and the stolen artifacts are returned.
One of the recovered coins is a bronze prutah, the lowest known denomination of Judean currency. Its purchasing power was weak: a loaf of bread cost about 10 of these. However, this one had been minted during the reign of the last Hasmonean king, Mattathias Antigonus, who ruled in Jerusalem from 40 to 37 B.C.E. It shows nothing less than the seven-branched menorah that stood in the Second Temple in Jerusalem on one side and the Temple’s showbread table on the flip side.
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An ancient and rare coin depicting the seven-branched menorah that stood in the Temple in Jerusalem. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
An ancient and rare coin depicting the seven-branched menorah that stood in the Temple in Jerusalem. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
Unlike the prutah, which was stolen and has now reappeared, the Temple’s menorah and showbread table vanished forever more. We do know that the Romans proudly boasted of looting them together with the rest of the Temple treasure in the year 70 C.E. Far from trying to conceal their thieving tracks, the Romans built not one but two triumphal arches following the conquest of Jerusalem. One is in ruins, but the surviving Arch of Titus in Rome actually depicts them carting off the sacred artifacts. This coin shows a very early artistic representation of the Temple menorah and is the only coin we know of that shows it, the IAA says.
As for the showbread table, this coin is possibly not the only depiction of it. Archaeologist Mordechai Aviam believes that the Magdala Stone, discovered in 2009 in Migdal by the Sea of Galilee, also shows that very thing on one of its five decorated faces. The showbread table was a ritual Temple item that the Bible commanded be made specifically of acacia and gold. The faithful would set on it the bread to display to the deity. There is some controversy over who would bake showbread, which was made in three specific shapes, and when and who would ultimately eat it. Haaretz religious affairs commentator Elon Gilad has suggested the showbread was baked on Fridays for a showbread replacement ritual on Shabbat.
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The ancient and rare coin depicting the showbread table that stood in the Temple in Jerusalem. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
The ancient and rare coin depicting the showbread table that stood in the Temple in Jerusalem. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
That was the first coin: a simple bronze prutah showing the holiest objects to Second Temple Judaism. In principle, Israel does not allow coins of such rarity to be exported.
The second coin wouldn’t have been allowed out of the country either. It was a lovely early silver tetradrachm from the Persian period, minted in Ascalon over 2,500 years ago, only a couple of centuries after the invention of coinage itself. Only one other of its type is known, and that one sits in the Israel Museum. Its design emulates the famous Athenian tetradrachm, which was the standard coin throughout the Eastern Mediterranean at the time.
One side depicts the helmeted goddess Athena, the other an owl, her companion in legend and a symbol of wisdom in Hellenistic culture. The owl is spreading its wings as owls do. Above the owl appear the letters “Aleph” and “Nun” in Phoenician script, the IAA says. That represents the first and last letters of the name Ascalon, which is modern day Ashkelon.
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A lovely early silver tetradrachm from the Persian period, minted in Ascalon over 2,500 years ago,depicting the goddess Athena. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
A lovely early silver tetradrachm from the Persian period, minted in Ascalon over 2,500 years ago,depicting the goddess Athena. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
How were these coins recovered? Detectives are as cagey about their sources as journalists, but let’s just say that the black world of antiquities cops and robbers is also rife with snitches, Haddad points out.
“Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, of illegal antiquities change hands yearly,” he says.
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Ancient artifacts are stolen and sold not only out of appreciation for history but to finance terrorism, launder crime funds, et cetera. “You name it, there’s an illegal trade in antiquities financing it,” he told Haaretz by phone. No police force could have the manpower to combat a phenomenon this broad. However, the second they get solid information or evidence, they can contact the appropriate partners in law enforcement in the host state.
In short, repatriating a stolen artifact can take years, not because the police don’t move like lightning when necessary but because the wheels of justice grind slowly, he notes.
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Holding up one of the coins, which were recovered in a complex international operation by Israeli and U.S. authorities. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
Holding up one of the coins, which were recovered in a complex international operation by Israeli and U.S. authorities. Credit: Eitan Klein/Israel Antiquities Aurhority
As for these two coins, both were stolen from the ground in Israel, and both were so rare that they could not possibly be sold in Israel. Thus, they had to be smuggled out of the country. Doing so is no great trick for a coin, Hadad points out – you can put it in your wallet and sail through airport security and customs. Following their removal from Israel, they had different trajectories.
One was first identified as a stolen coin making the rounds in 2019, he says. But establishing the crime and organizing the resolution took time. The other went on auction this past January. And when they finally do get onto a flight, securely guarded and not in some rando’s wallet, they will be brought home to the loving arms of the IAA, which will then decide what to do with them.