Theft of the Villena Treasure

The Villena Treasure, one of the most famous hoards from Bronze Age Europe, has been stolen.

The hoard was uncovered by archaeologists in 1963. The style of the bowls in particular was common across Europe in that era, and these look just like bowls bound in Germany. As often happens when amazing archaeological discoveries turn up in out-of-the-way places, local people wanted the collection to remain close to them. So a new museum was built to display the collection and other finds from the area.

But these local museums don't have the security arrangements of a great museum, so they get robbed all the time.

Object of meteoric iron

And now it has happened again. Of course, the Louvre also got robbed recently in a similar smash-and-grab style, so big museums are not entirely safe. But they are much safer than small musuems are.