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Thief of ancient Spanish maps caught in Argentina

Oct 17, 2007, 11:01 GMT

Madrid - A man suspected of stealing valuable ancient maps and other documents from Spain's National Library has given himself up to police in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires, library director Milagros del Corral said Wednesday in Madrid. The 60-year-old Spaniard of Uruguayan origin, whose name was given as Cesar Gomez Rivero, lives in Argentina. He still had in his possession several documents which were believed to have been taken from the library. Gomez is suspected of tearing 12 pages of documents from books in the library, which he visited between 2004 and 2007. The man, who pretended to be a historian, smuggled in a small knife, according to the daily El Pais. The documents included two world maps by 2nd-century Greek geographer Ptolemy. One of the maps, which was taken from a 16th-century edition of Ptolemy's Geographia, has reportedly been found in the possession of a New York collector. Its value was estimated at about 100,000 euros (140,000 dollars). The theft of the documents, which was made public in August, prompted the resignation of Rosa Regas, del Corral's predecessor as the director of one of Spain's most prestigious cultural institutions. © 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur

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Thief of ancient Spanish maps caught in Argentina

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