The San Antonio Museum of Art (Sama) has repatriated nine antiquities to Italy, eight of which were identified through photographs that had been seized from the convicted dealer and smuggler Giacomo Medici. The ninth object, a marble head of the Greek god Hermes, had been excavated from ancient Roman houses on the Caelian Hill in Rome in the late 19th century and, decades later, was sold to the San Antonio collector Gilbert M. Denman Jr by an Italian antiquities dealer who provided no provenance documents; Denman donated it to the Sama in 1986.
The museum and the Italian Ministry of Culture had signed a long-term agreement on cultural collaboration and exchange in 2023, and had been in discussions about the present repatriations for more than a year. Under the terms of the agreement, eight of the nine repatriated artefacts will remain on display at the Sama, on loan from Italy.
