Antique Roman Grave Marker Discovered in NOLA Yard Deposited by American Serviceman's Granddaughter
The historic Roman grave marker newly found in a back yard in New Orleans appears to have been inherited and left there by the heir of a US soldier who served in Italy in the World War II.
Through comments that practically resolved an worldwide ancient riddle, Erin Scott O’Brien informed area journalists that her grandfather, the veteran, stored the 1,900-year-old relic in a showcase at his residence in New Orleans’ Gentilly area until he died in 1986.
She explained she was unsure exactly how the soldier acquired something reported missing from an museum in Italy near Rome that lost a large part of its holdings during World War II attacks. But the soldier fought in Italy with the American military throughout the conflict, married his wife Adele there, and went back to New Orleans to work as a singing instructor, O’Brien recounted.
It was fairly common for military personnel who fought in Europe in World War II to return with keepsakes.
“I just thought it was a piece of art,” O’Brien said. “I was unaware it was a millennia-old … historical object.”
In any event, what O’Brien initially thought was a plain marble piece was eventually passed down to her after the veteran’s demise, and she set it as a yard ornament in the rear area of a home she purchased in the city’s Carrollton area in 2003. She neglected to retrieve the item with her when she moved out in 2018 to a pair who found the object in March while clearing away brush.
The husband and wife – anthropologist Daniella Santoro of the academic institution and her husband, the co-owner – recognized the object had an inscription in the Latin language. They sought advice from researchers who established the artifact was a grave marker memorializing a around 2nd-century Roman seafarer and military member named Sextus Congenius Verus.
Furthermore, the team learned, the grave marker fit the description of one documented as absent from the city museum of Civitavecchia, Italy, near where it had first discovered, as a participating scholar – UNO archaeologist Dr. Gray – stated in a article published online Monday.
The couple have since handed over the artifact to the FBI’s art crime team, and plans to return the relic to the Italian museum are ongoing so that institution can exhibit correctly it.
O’Brien, who resides in the New Orleans suburb of Metairie, said she recalled her grandpa’s unusual artifact again after the publication had received coverage from the global press. She said she reached out to journalists after a phone call from her previous partner, who told her that he had seen a news story about the item that her ancestor had once owned – and that it truly was to be a item from one of the history’s renowned empires.
“We were utterly amazed,” the granddaughter expressed. “It’s astonishing how this all happened.”
The archaeologist, however, said it was a comfort to discover how the ancient soldier’s gravestone traveled behind a house more than a great distance away from its original location.
“I expected we would compile a list of potential individuals connected to its journey,” the archaeologist stated. “I never imagined we would locate the precise individual – thus, it’s thrilling to learn the full story.”
