NEW YORK, May 4 (UPI) -- The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York says it has no plans to return an ancient chariot to a tiny town in Italy.
The Etruscan chariot was dug up intact more than a century ago in Monteleone di Spoleto, population 651. Famed financier J.P. Morgan reportedly bought it in 1903 and gave it to the museum, where the chariot now is the centerpiece of Greek and Roman art.
Nando Durastanti, the mayor of Monteleone di Spoleto, insists the chariot was stolen from Italy and now must be returned, ABC News reported Friday.
Metropolitan spokesman Harold Holzer said Durastanti is welcome to come and view the chariot anytime but it is staying at the museum.
"Asking for this chariot to be returned because it belongs to Italy is like saying that the Met should not exhibit anything that isn't from New York," Holzer said. "It's absurd, and the height of insular thinking."
