After being stolen in a million-dollar robbery in 2019 and then rediscovered in the years that followed, the historic jewels of the Green Vault are now back on display in Dresden.
The Green Vault in the city’s Royal Palace was built as a special facility to store precious metals, works of art and artifacts collected by the Saxon Elector Augustus the Strong, who later served as King of Poland from 1723 to 1729.
Five members of a criminal gang broke into the Green Vault during a nighttime robbery in November 2019. They were sentenced to six years in prison last year for stealing the treasure of 18th-century jewelry.
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The group, known as the Remmo clan, a family crime network operating in Germany, smashed the glass in the display cases with an axe, pocketed 21 pieces of jewelry and fled within five minutes. The stolen Saxon royal artifacts contain more than 4,300 diamonds and are collectively worth 114 million euros (about $125 million). The thieves were eventually convicted of armed robbery, aggravated arson and grievous bodily harm.
The Green Vault announced the public reopening of the gems and other relics with an exhibition restored “almost in all its splendor” and in which the majority of the jewels were recovered.
“The jewels will be presented exactly as they were returned to the Dresden State Art Collections – with barely visible damage, but in need of restoration,” said Marion Ackermann, General Director of the Dresden State Art Collections. in a statement.
After the robbery, the district court allowed the confiscated artifacts to be returned to the museum for exhibition.
“In 2019, criminal clans from Berlin took possession of our cultural heritage,” said Saxony’s Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer in German in a post on X“But we fought for our treasure!”
Although the diamond-studded breast star of the Polish Order of the White Eagle and a diamond-studded sword were seized by German law enforcement authorities in late 2022, the missing items still include a large breast bow of Queen Amalie Auguste, made of 611 small diamonds made of silver and gold, and an epaulette containing the so-called Saxon White Diamond.
An international commission of experts will advise on the restoration of the recovered jewels.
