This is a super fun true story that happened in 1891 at the site of the Baños de la Reina (the Roman remains opposite the beach).
A German archaeologist arrived in Calpe, captivated by the area’s archaeology. He uncovered a beautiful Roman mosaic and, instead of reporting it, decided it would look better in the living room of his home in Germany. To smuggle it out of the country, he came up with a plan: he dismantled the mosaic, put the pieces into large sacks, and covered them completely with almonds.
Almonds, carob pods, and a miscalculation
Knowing that removing a piece of that caliber from the country was completely illegal, the German man devised a covert strategy. He dismantled the mosaic with extreme care and hid the heavy stone tesserae at the bottom of large burlap sacks. To disguise them completely and avoid raising suspicions at customs, he filled the rest of the sacks with the agricultural product most abundant and exported from the area at the time: local carob pods and almonds.
The plan was perfect on paper, but the scholar forgot one crucial detail: the density of Roman stone. When the sacks arrived at Calpe port, ready to be loaded onto a ship, the local dockworkers and sailors went ahead and loaded them. As soon as the first sack was lifted, the sailors’ back-cracking sound gave the scam away. It was three times as heavy as any shipment of dried fruit should have been.
Sensing possible smuggling, the locals opened the sacks right there in the middle of the port. Before the astonished eyes of the fishermen, the almonds made way for the ancient Roman stones. The German scholar was caught red-handed, and Calpe’s heritage was saved thanks to the ingenuity (and strength) of its people.
Did you know? The mosaic recovered in Calpe port is preserved today in perfect condition and can be admired legally in the Roman Culture room at the MARQ (Archaeological Museum of Alicante).
