AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS—Ahram Online reports that an ancient limestone statue confiscated by Dutch police has been handed over to the Egyptian embassy in Amsterdam. Shaaban Abdel Gawad of the Antiquities Repatriation Department of the Ministry of Antiquities said the statue was noticed by Egyptian authorities when it was put on display in Holland last year. Hieroglyphs carved on the sculpture identify it as an official named Nekaw-Ptah, who is shown standing and wearing a short wig. The inscription also indicates that Nekaw-Ptah lived during the First Intermediate Period, which spanned about 125 years beginning at the end of the Old Kingdom period, around 2181 B.C. Egyptian officials say the statue was looted from the Saqqara necropolis in the 1990s. To read in-depth about recent excavations in Egypt, go to "Egypt's Eternal City."
