Authorities across Egypt are searching for a 3,000-year-old bracelet reported missing from a leading museum in Cairo.
The rare gold band, adorned with spherical lapis lazuli beads, dates back to the reign of King Amenemope, a pharaoh of ancient Egypt’s 21st Dynasty who ruled from 993 to 984BC.
The antiquities ministry said it had taken immediate measures after the bracelet disappeared from the Egyptian Museum’s restoration laboratory, and that the case had been referred to police.
An image of the bracelet has been circulated to all Egyptian airports, seaports and land border crossings as a “precautionary step to prevent smuggling attempts”, the ministry added.
A specialist committee has also been formed to carry out an inventory and review of all artefacts being kept at the restoration laboratory.
The ministry said it had deliberately delayed announcing the bracelet’s disappearance “to ensure an appropriate environment for the progress of investigations”, but it did not mention when the piece of jewellery was last seen.
Egyptian newspaper, Al-Misri al-Yawm, reported that the disappearance was detected in recent days as museum staff were preparing to ship dozens of artefacts to Rome for an exhibition which is due to open next month.
The Egyptian Museum in Cairo is the oldest archaeological museum in the Middle East. It houses more than 170,000 artefacts, including Amenemope’s gilded wooden funerary mask.
The bracelet’s disappearance comes six weeks before the opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum in nearby Giza, where the world renowned treasures of King Tutankhamun’s tomb have been transferred and will go on display.