A quartet of thieves made off with priceless necklaces, tiaras, and earrings encrusted with thousands of diamonds and other gems after breaking into the Louvre in Paris on the morning of October 19.
Staff and visitors were present when the thieves—hooded, masked, and dressed as construction workers—pulled a basket lift up next to the world’s most visited museum at about 9:30 a.m. Two of the burglars ascended in the lift to the institution’s Apollo Gallery, where they used an angle grinder to cut through a window, triggering an alarm. Once inside, they smashed two cases, snatched up the contents, and absconded via the lift, where they escaped on motor scooters with their two compatriots, having carried out the entire caper in just seven minutes. Video footage showed the group headed southeast through Paris toward the A6 highway.
The jewels are of tremendous national worth and their value incalculable. Among the eight items stolen were an emerald and diamond necklace given by Napoleon to his second wife, Marie Louise, and a sapphire necklace and sapphire earrings worn by Napoleon’s stepdaughter Hortense, the daughter of his first wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais, and the eventual queen of Holland; and by Marie Amélie, the last queen of France. A diamond brooch and diamond-studded decorative bow belonging to Empress Eugénie were also taken, as was her pearl-and-diamond tiara.
The thieves dropped two pieces in their haste to get away. The museum has not named one of them, but the other is a crown worn in the nineteenth century by Empress Eugénie, the wife of Napoleon III. Decorated with eight golden eagles and encrusted with 1,354 diamonds, 1,136 rose-cut diamonds, and 56 emeralds, it was found broken near the museum.
The Louvre closed for the day following the theft, with panicked visitors, many of whom mistakenly believed a terrorist attack was taking place, shepherded out. Calling the burglary “an attack on a heritage that we cherish because it is our History,” French president Emmanuel Macron in a statement posted to social media vowed to catch the thieves. “We will recover the works, and the perpetrators will be brought to justice,” he wrote. “Everything is being done, everywhere, to achieve this.” Time is of the essence in capturing the criminals, as it is feared that they will melt the treasures down and sell their components piecemeal.
