ABOVE: a terra cotta urn in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art that Italy has claimed is looted.

The Italian minister of culture jumped the gun a bit by crowing about the likelihood that the Metropolitan Museum of Art will return some Italian artifacts, as the Getty Museum has done. Bloomberg News reports that the culture minister, Rocco Buttiglione, said that “If we have conclusive evidence, and we think we have, then they are ready to give it back.” The met declined to comment on the whole thing.

This campaign is obviously having an effect, as museum directors, like the Met’s Philippe de Montebello, are willing to sit down with Italian authorities to negotiate terms of endearment surrender on individual artworks, and are even, apparently, discussing ideas like swapping the allegedly looted items for replacement baubles with the Italian seal of approval on them.

We know this has lately turned into the all-Getty/Italy-all-the-time blog, but developments like this confirm for us that this is a BFD for American museums.

LINK: Bloomberg > Met Will Return Disputed Art to Italy, Culture Minister Says