Only a few months ago, The Guardian reported the repatriation of some pieces of the Sevso Treasure to Hungary.
With the Germans having recently managed to recover a looted treasure before it disappeared and with the looting of Iraqi museums after the invasion of Iraq still on our minds, we decided to spend a few minutes of research into the Sevso story.
As late as 2012, a museumsstudies paper author appears to have been overwhelmed by its complexity.
An case study on traffickingculture.org deals with the treasure, but the best information really is a surprising video on YouTube: Time Team Special 39 (2008) - The Mystery of the Roman Treasure.
Time Team was a well thought out British Channel 4 archeology show with a 3 day dig format for the regular shows and a cast of professionals from various archeological specialties.
Having had ample time to enjoy the thoroughness of the regular Time Team series, the The Mystery of the Roman Treasure makes a very solid case for Hungary as the home of the Sevso treasure.
While the piece in The Guardian is a carefully crafted article, the Time Team Special is an eye opening look at some of the shortcomings of official investigations and introduces evidence previously not well covered by the bigger media.
The last paragraph of the Guardian news quotes the lawyer of the British aristocrat as saying the "best pieces" are with the marquess. A sentence worth reading more than once.
Who knows, these days, it might be interesting to look on the web, on professional networking sites for some of the surviving actors in the Sevso saga. If anyone would like to share their personal knowledge of events and timelines, we will listen.
Of course, we'll probably never know if the Romans themselves looted the silver used to craft the treasure or if they acquired it fair and square by the standards of their days.
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