On the evening of 31 May 1944....German soldiers were preparing to evacuate the Italian city of Nemi. If you were looking on a map, it's a small town ten miles south of Rome (central region of Italy).
Americans were advancing and the Germans had their orders to leave.
So this odd thing happens.....as part of the plan, the Germans set fire to a number of buildings in the town, and among them....a museum.
The significance of the museum? Well....it held two ancient Roman vessels. They had been found on the bottom of the local lake in the late 1920s.
N-TV brought up this discussion today, which has begun in the town of Nemi. The mayor and locals want the Germans to compensate them for the two burnt Roman vessels and the Museum.
The amount? Not openly discussed.
Why burn the museum and the two Roman vessels? This is the hard part of the story which is left out, and you have to wonder about.
One could understand burning a fuel depot, a railway repair facility, or blowing up some runway.
One can understand destroying a bridge.
But a plain museum and two Roman vessels?
What drove this plan and need to destroy the facility? Unknown. The odds of money or compensation coming out of this? Probably near zero (they should have done this in the 1960s).
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