Denise Milan Toppless

steal a piece of the Colosseum and returning after 25 years repent

The temptation to take home a piece of ancient Rome was too strong and so a couple of American tourists had stolen a piece of travertine at the Coliseum, taking home in North Carolina a souvenir symbol of the capital. But after 25 years they have repented and have returned today to the fragment of Imperial Rome apologizing and saying he regretted "a selfish and superficial gesture." "We should have done much earlier, but we apologize and give back what we took to the Coliseum five years ago, so back to the place where he belongs", wrote the two Americans in a note that accompanied the parcel delivered today to the finding ' Regional Tourism Promotion Agency of Rome and Lazio. Inside the parcel left from Greensboro, "a stone with my husband we took as a souvenir," writes the anonymous woman who said she had felt guilty every time, looking at his collection of souvenir collected on trips of a lifetime, the eye fell on that piece removed from the monument symbol of Rome.
"Over the years - she writes - I thought that if all the visitors of this beautiful monument, it would take some time, it would not anymore. Our gesture was a selfish and superficial. " The fragment, small enough to enter into a pocket, is now waiting to return to the Archaeological Superintendence of Rome, immediately contacted by the Regional Tourist Board of Rome and Lazio. "The Colosseum, Rome and its monuments are the dream of tourists from around the world - said the Minister of Tourism, Region of Lazio, Claudio Mancini - The message is that visitors get of our city continue to care about it even after so many years. We would like to trace these people and invite them to a new journey in the capital. " It is not the first time that tourists visiting the eternal city are trying to bring home souvenirs of ancient Rome. Last August, a German tourist had hidden in his knapsack a piece of archaeological, taken from the Imperial Forum, weighing 9 pounds. In April 2006, another visitor was leaving from Fiumicino airport to Dusseldorf with a fragment of a Corinthian capital of the Roman era in the suitcase. In 2005, however, was amputated sixteenth Fountain of Fighter in front of Villa Celimontana.

source: Leggo.it