Jewellery and artefacts from one of Spain's most important prehistoric gold collections have been stolen from a museum in the province of Alicante. The 'Treasure of Villena', a unique trove of almost ten kilos of gold, bowls, bottles, and bracelets dating back to the Bronze Age, was targeted in the early hours of Friday morning.
The operation at Villena Museum was described by a spokesman for Villena town council as "super fast and super professional". The city council reported that the robbery began with a diversion, with alarms at a local sports centre sounding around 05:15 local time (03:15 GMT), drawing police there first. The museum's alarm then activated around 05:20, and thieves reportedly took just four minutes to sweep through the museum and leave before officers arrived.
The Mayor of Villena, Fulgencio Cerdán, stated that the thieves "stole a large part of the treasure," specifically all the gold. The collection, discovered in 1963, dates back to around 1,000 BC and includes 29 bracelets, 11 bowls, and three bottles among its more than 60 objects. The Villena council spokesman insisted there had been "no failure" by the museum, stating that "all security systems were activated."
This incident follows a series of high-profile heists at European museums. In October 2025, thieves stole jewellery worth $102m (£75m) from the Louvre museum in Paris, and last week, four works by Renaissance artist Antonello da Messina were stolen from a museum in Sicily.