Wall Street Journalさんのインスタグラム写真 - (Wall Street JournalInstagram)「Ittai Gradel, an academic–turned–gem dealer in Denmark, was trawling eBay a decade ago when he thought he had stumbled across a gold mine.⁠ ⁠ Gradel saw a seller advertising a glass gem from the 19th century. Gradel immediately recognized it as something much more valuable: an agate Roman Medusa cameo from the second century. He snapped it up for £15 plus postage, then turned around and sold it to a collector for a couple of thousand pounds.⁠ ⁠ In the following years, the same seller kept unearthing incredible finds at rock-bottom prices. Gradel inquired as to how he had come across these items. The seller said he had acquired them from his grandfather, who died in 1953. The oddly credible backstory left Gradel comfortable that he had encountered every dealer’s dream seller. ⁠ ⁠ Then, in 2016, the seller posted a piece on eBay by mistake. Intrigued by the item, Gradel screenshotted it. But the seller quickly removed it from the website and said that it actually belonged to his sister, who didn’t want to sell it. ⁠ ⁠ Gradel thought not much more about it. But in 2020, he came across an image on the British Museum’s website that showed the exact same item in its collection. Furthermore, the color photograph was recent. It suddenly dawned on Gradel: There was a thief in the British Museum. “And he was likely still within the walls,” he says.⁠ ⁠ So began an antiques whodunit that has shaken the premise behind the museum’s most important reason for existing: that it is the best place to safely house some of the world’s greatest treasures. ⁠ ⁠ Read more at the link in our bio. ⁠ ⁠ 📷: @felixodell for @wsjmag」11月6日 1時00分