Italian police recover £6m treasure looted by amateur 'tomb raiders'

Ancient artefacts worthy astatine slightest €8m (£6.7m) person been recovered aft being stolen by "tomb raiders" who accidentally recovered them connected their onshore successful Italy.

The pieces included 8 urns, sarcophagi and quality accessories specified arsenic a bronze reflector and a perfume vessel which inactive smelled of its scent.

They were taken from an Etruscan necropolis successful Citta della Pieve, astir 90 miles (150km) northbound of Rome.

The urns were painted with scenes from Greek mythology and 1 sarcophagus held the afloat skeleton of a pistillate successful her forties.

Police recovered the artefacts from 2 entrepreneurs who recovered the burial chambers portion excavating their land, said Perugia main authoritative Raffaele Cantone.

He said they "had thing to bash with the satellite of (practised) tomb raiders" but were "clumsy" and "amateurish" successful the mode they tried to entree the achromatic market.

They were enactment nether probe erstwhile they posted pictures of the loot online to effort to find buyers.

Authorities started bugging the suspects' phones, conducting stakeouts and utilizing drones to support tabs connected them.

Police yet swooped erstwhile 1 of them enactment a representation connected Facebook showing himself with 1 of the pieces, said Mr Cantone.

The brace look charges of theft and trading successful stolen goods and could beryllium jailed for up to 10 years if convicted.

In 2015, different Etruscan tomb was recovered by a husbandman successful Citta della Pieve - however, it was reported and they got a reward of astir €100,000 (£83,000).

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The Etruscans were affluent and near down lavish tombs but fewer written documents.

They originated successful Tuscany during the Bronze Age but gradually declined implicit the people of hundreds of years and the past of their cities were assimilated into the Roman Empire astir 100BC.