The pharaoh's gold bracelet was stolen by thieves. The ancient treasure is over 3,000 years old.

A three-thousand-year-old bracelet belonging to Pharaoh Amenemope was stolen from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. How did this happen?

Gold usually attracts the attention of thieves, and gold worth over three thousand is not at all.

Police have launched an investigation into a pharaoh's gold bracelet decorated with lapis lazuli beads that disappeared from the conservation laboratory at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo .

As we read in the entry by the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities , lapis lazuli is a semi-precious stone of deep blue with flecks of gold, which, according to the inhabitants of ancient Egypt , had healing powers and was used to make statues of deities and scarabs.

A bracelet belonging to Pharaoh Amenemope was stolen from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Photo: Abdullah Elhariry / Unsplash

The jewelry, which was most likely stolen, belonged to King Amenemope , a pharaoh of the 21st Dynasty who reigned from 993 to 984 B.C. It was being restored in preparation for being loaned to the "Treasures of the Pharaohs" exhibition, which opens on October 24 at the Scuderie del Quirinale in Rome.

The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities said it had taken immediate legal and administrative action regarding the bracelet's disappearance.

A photo of the missing bracelet was distributed to antiquities units at all Egyptian airports , seaports and land border crossings across the country as a precautionary measure to prevent smuggling attempts.

A special commission was also appointed to compile an inventory and review all artifacts stored in the conservation laboratory.

The ministry's Facebook post included a photo of a similar specimen currently on display in a museum.

"The bracelets shown in these photos are already on display in the galleries on the second floor of the museum. The missing bracelet, currently under investigation, is a different piece. It is a gold bracelet adorned with spherical lapis lazuli beads, belonging to King Amenemope from the Third Intermediate Period ," the post reads.

The Ministry also stressed that the announcement of the incident was deliberately delayed to ensure appropriate conditions for the investigation.