LOS ANGELES _ Seven ancient Mayan artifacts that were in the possession of a California collector were returned to Guatemala on Friday, decades after the "priceless" hieroglyph carvings were looted from the Central American country.
The pre-Columbian artifacts are four large tablets and three small limestone fragments with carvings of Mayan hieroglyphics and iconography.
The FBI turned over the items, displayed on a long blue table, to the Guatemalan government at a morning news conference at the FBI offices in Los Angeles.
"The pieces ... are more than a 1,000 years old and have a cultural significance to the Guatemalan people which is invaluable," said Deirdre Fike, FBI assistant director in charge.
Federal authorities said the pieces were in possession of a collector who unknowingly purchased them in the 1970s from a man who was known to deal in looted antiquities.
When the collector died earlier this year, a representative managing the estate could not determine the date the pieces were brought to the United States or their provenance and contacted the FBI.
The U.S., along with dozens of other countries, is party to the 1970 UNESCO Convention, which prohibits and prevents the illicit import, export and transfer of ownership of cultural property.
Under a bilateral agreement with Guatemala, which restricts the importation of archaeology artifacts into the U.S., the FBI decided to return the Mayan pieces to the government.
Roberto Archila, the Los Angeles consul general of Guatemala, said the artifacts would be shipped to a Guatemalan museum.
"The return of these pieces which speak to our country, culture and our people is very important to us," said Archila, who described the artifacts as "priceless."
"This is our heritage," he said.
