A masterly theft occurred on the morning of Sunday 19 October 2025 at the Louvre Museum in Paris thanks to a common goods lift and a simple grinder. The stolen goods? Eight very precious Napoleon jewels contained in the Apollo Gallery, the room where the French Crown Jewels are kept. The value of the stolen goods, according to the French Ministry of Culture, is considered “priceless”.
The stolen jewels of “priceless” value
In the official press release, the French Ministry of Culture states that the value of the stolen jewels is “priceless“: this means that an exact figure cannot be assigned because it is decidedly very high, in addition to the fact that, probably, the Ministry does not want to disclose data to the public. Below, the exact list of stolen jewelery as reported in the press release:
- Tiara, necklace and one earring from the parure of Queen Maria-Amalia (wife of Louis Bonaparte) and Queen Hortense (wife of King Philippe I): these wonderful sapphire jewels are a precious testimony of Parisian high jewellery, made in the 19th century. The tiara is made up of 24 Ceylon sapphires and 1,083 diamonds, the necklace with eight sapphires, surrounded by diamonds in a precious gold setting, and the earrings – of which one is stolen – are made up of set sapphires. Originally these jewels were part of an even larger set, it is also said that some of the sapphires may have belonged to Empress Josephine, first wife of Napoleon Bonaparte.
- Emerald necklace and pair of earrings from Maria-Luisa’s set: the necklace and earrings – purchased by the Louvre in 2004 for 3.7 million euros, a figure which at the time was described as the highest price ever paid by a museum for jewelery – were donated by Napoleon to his second wife, Marie Louise, on the occasion of their wedding in 1810. The necklace is made up of 32 emeralds, some pearl-shaped and others lozenge-shaped, and 1,138 diamonds. The set was designed by the Parisian jewelers Etienne Nitot et fils: initially there was also a tiara, which was purchased in 1971. The tiara was purchased by the American entrepreneur and philanthropist Marjorie Merriweather Post, who donated the precious jewel to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, where it is still preserved today.
- Brooch called “reliquary” of Empress Eugenie (wife of Napoleon III, last sovereign of France): dating back to 1885, this splendid diamond brooch is called a “reliquary”, as if relics or hidden treasures were preserved inside. The Louvre states that the size and workmanship of the object do not allow space to accommodate anything inside it.
- Crown of Empress Eugenie: This tiara features 212 pearls, 1,998 diamonds and 992 rose-cut diamonds. Thanks to the intervention of security, the thieves abandoned it and let it fall, and it was then recovered. The tiara alone is worth “several tens of millions of euros”, according to the estimate expressed by the president of the Drouot auction house, Alexandre Giquello.
- Large corset knot of Empress Eugenie: This is a decorative bow brooch with jeweled tassels, which originally probably belonged to a belt. It includes 2,438 white diamonds and 196 pink-cut diamonds.
How the theft happened and what is stored in the Apollo gallery
The robbery happened Sunday 19 Octobershortly after the Louvre opens to the public, between 09.30 and 09.40. As the images taken from the street confirm, the thieves – dressed as workers in yellow vests – used a parked mechanical hoist which allowed them to access the window through the Apollo Gallerylocated on the first floor, the Museum area where the French Crown Jewels.
They are preserved here crowns, tiaras, sets of precious stones, tiaras, diamonds and other wonderful jewels which, over the centuries, have belonged to the sovereigns of France: we find, for example, the crown of Charlemagne, that of Napoleon, numerous jewels belonging to queens and empresses such as those stolen, and also some diamonds, including the very famous Régen Diamondt, long considered the largest in the world, set by Napoleon on his sword and also belonged to Marie Antoinette.
Two thieves cut the glass with a battery-powered disc cutter, entered the museum and threatened the guards. The security immediately cleared the premises of the Gallery which applied the alarm protocol, but in the meantime the thieves stole the jewels from the high security display cases: the alarms located on the external window of the Apollo Gallery and on the two display cases were activated, but it was not enough. The two thieves escaped, and fortunately there are no injuries neither among the public nor among the agents. Meanwhile, the museum will remain closed today.
