{"id":155492,"date":"2026-04-02T16:03:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T16:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/155492\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T16:03:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T16:03:09","slug":"a-priceless-ancient-golden-helmet-stolen-from-a-dutch-museum-is-recovered-ap-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/155492\/","title":{"rendered":"A priceless ancient golden helmet stolen from a Dutch museum is recovered | Ap-world"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>ASSEN, Netherlands (AP) \u2014 A priceless ancient <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/netherlands-cotofenesti-helmet-heist-romania-0a6dbb8e742c0a5315244fc47761b7cb\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">golden helmet from Romania<\/a> stolen last year from a museum in the Netherlands has been recovered, Dutch authorities announced Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>Under the guard of heavily armed, balaclava-clad police, prosecutors unveiled the 2,500-year-old Cotofenesti helmet, one of Romania\u2019s most revered national treasures from the Dacia civilization, during a news conference in the eastern Dutch city of Assen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are incredibly pleased,\u201d Corien Fahner of the prosecution service told reporters. \u201cIt has been a roller-coaster. Especially for Romania, but also for employees of the Drents Museum.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The helmet was on display at the small museum in January 2025, the last weekend of a six-month-long exhibition, when thieves broke in and grabbed it, along with three golden wristbands.<\/p>\n<p>There were fears the helmet may have been melted down because its fame and dramatic studded appearance made it virtually unsellable.<\/p>\n<p>Two of three missing armbands were also recovered as part of a deal prosecutors reached with three men arrested for the heist shortly after it occurred. Their trial will begin later in April.<\/p>\n<p>Fahner said the search for the remaining armband would continue.<\/p>\n<p>The helmet did not return unscathed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe helmet is slightly dented, but there will be no permanent damage,\u201d Drents Museum director Robert van Langh said during the news conference. \u201cThe armbands are in perfect condition.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Thieves used a homemade firework bomb and sledgehammer to break into the museum. Grainy security video distributed by police after the raid appeared to show three people opening a museum door with a large crowbar, followed by an explosion.<\/p>\n<p>The theft put a strain on relations between the Netherlands and Romania<\/p>\n<p>Romanian Justice Minister Radu Marinescu last year called the incident a \u201ccrime against our state\u201d and said recovering the artifacts \u201cis an absolute priority.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n<p>Associated Press writers Molly Quell and Mike Corder contributed from The Hague, Netherlands.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ASSEN, Netherlands (AP) \u2014 A priceless ancient golden helmet from Romania stolen last year from a museum in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155493,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,31,70396,1681,38,1856,209,301],"class_list":{"0":"post-155492","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-allentown","8":"tag-allentown","9":"tag-allentown-headlines","10":"tag-allentown-news","11":"tag-crime","12":"tag-dutch-golden-helmet-romania-stolen-recovered-cotofenesti","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-general-news","15":"tag-law-enforcement","16":"tag-theft","17":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}