The works include a ceramic vessel dated from the 7th Century BCE called “Pithos with Ulysses” and a terracotta image of a goddess entitled “A Head of a Maiden” from the 4th Century BCE.
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said 150 of the artifacts related to his office’s investigation into Edoardo Almagia.
He was an Italian New York-based antiquities dealer who left the United States in 2003.
Vance said Almagia was investigated in Italy for trafficking and selling looted artifacts to US buyers but remains at large.
Vance added that 100 of the returned artworks had been seized from the Fordham Museum of Greek, Etruscan, and Roman Art in New York.
This latest batch of returned antiquities represents just some of the stolen artefacts the US has restored to Italy in recent years.
In 2017, US officials returned artefacts worth at least $90,000, dating back as far as the 8th century BC, that had been stolen in the 1990s from burial sites and places of archaeological significance in Italy and smuggled overseas.
READ ALSO: The US just returned $90,000 worth of stolen artefacts to Italy
The items included a Sardinian bronze ox and Sardinian bronze warrior from the 8th century BC, a Greek bronze Heracles from the 3rd or 4th century BC and a 4th-century BC drinking cup depicting two goats butting heads.
In 2018, three stolen items were returned to Italy from the US after Italian Carabinieri officers from the country’s famous ‘art squad’ or cultural heritage unit saw that they had been listed for sale by a New York auction house.
The ancient Greek items – a wine carafe, a decanter for precious oils and a soup tureen – had been illegally dug out of an archaeological site in Italy and smuggled into America.
Speaking at a 2018 ‘repatriation ceremony’ held at the headquarters of the Italian Embassy in Washington, DC, where the artefacts were formally returned to the Italian government, Italy’s then-culture minister said the government planned to crack down on such crimes.
READ ALSO: Italy to crack down on art crime after stolen artefacts recovered in USA
Since August 2020, the New York district attorney’s office has returned more than 70 antiquities to 14 countries, including almost 30 relics to Cambodia, 100 artifacts to Pakistan, and almost 250 items to India.
Earlier this month, Vance announced that prominent US art collector and billionaire philanthropist Michael Steinhardt had returned 180 works of art and antiquities stolen from around the world – some from ancient Greece – that are estimated to be worth $70 million.
The move allowed the 80-year-old to avoid indictment and trial for the time being, but bans him for life from acquiring antiques on the legal art market.
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