The Lost Treasure A piece of history

A PIECE OF HISTORY

The Lost Treasure

The late 17th-century monstrance made from gilded copper with silver filigree, coral, and glass ornaments was originally from Naples and is part of what is known as the Loreto treasure. Chiusa/Klausen received this “treasure” from Maria Anna, Queen of Spain. Her personal confessor, Capuchin Father Gabriel Pontifeser, had asked her to set up a monastery in his hometown around the year 1700. She also donated several liturgical items, paintings, and other works of art mainly by 16th- and 17th-century artists from Spain and Italy. The collection was named after the Loreto chapel, where it had been kept safe for almost 290 years.

But during the night of 26/27 May 1986, large parts of the collection were stolen in a spectacular heist, still known across South Tyrol as the “robbery of the century”. Investigators even found evidence suggesting the crime had been commissioned by someone linked to international drug trade. One year after the incident, some items were found in Verona, and later, in 1989, large parts of the treasure were recovered in Switzerland. The collection was brought back to Chiusa and exhibited at the town’s museum, which opened in 1992. Almost all of the china—just one cup was missing—was found in a 1998 drug raid in Mestre, near Venice.

The most valuable items of the Loreto treasure, which included several chalices, cruets, and the above-mentioned monstrance, were finally recovered in 2013 by a special division of theCarabinieri police. Following extensive restoration work, the 23 remaining items were first displayed at a special exhibition in Rome before making their way home to Chiusa, where they are now on display at the Museum of Chiusa.

Museum of Chiusa

+ The museum is situated in the old Capuchin monastery. The most popular exhibits include the Loreto treasure and the works of the Chiusa Artists’ Colony led by Alexander Koester.

+ Chiusa, Capuchin Monastery, Fraghes 1, phone: +39 0472 846 148, open late March to early November

www.museumklausenchiusa.it

Monstrance

Age: last quarter of the 17th century

Origin: Naples Material: gilded copper, silver filigree, coral, and glass ornaments