Object Description

Statue of a Greek Archaic Marble Kore

Marble statue of a female figure, dated at ca 530 BC, preserved from the neck down to about the knees.

Identification Date

19 Jul 2006

Identification Location

Jean Paul Getty Museum, California, US.

Artefact History

Before 1993

Twenty-one regular-print images in the archive confiscated from the antiquities dealer Giacomo Medici, depict the kore statue still covered with soil, with fresh hits and standing on a carpet, with an armchair covered by a red cloth in the background.

Before 1993

Medici sold the kore statue to the Greek illicit antiquities dealer Nikola Koutoulakis.

Before 1993

Symes and Michaelides acquire the statue from Nikola Koutoulakis.

10 Jun 1993

Robin Symes and Christos Michaelides sold the kore statue to the Getty Museum for $3,300,000.

19 Jul 2006

Tsirogiannis identifies the kore statue from the Medici images.

December 2006

The Greek Ministry of Culture and the Getty director Michael Brand announce that the kore will be returned to Greece.

Artefact Status

March 2007

On March 2007, the kore statue was repatriated to Greece, together with the gold Greek Macedonian wreath. 

Read more : 
The Medici Conspiracy, 2007:306-324.