Reviews & Praise
The Lost Chalice: SmartMoney’s 5 Smart Books
Link: SmartMoney on The Lost Chalice
“The Lost Chalice” is the fascinating story of how a band of grave robbers turned up two priceless ancient works of art — and how these ill-gotten masterpieces made their way to Sotheby’s, to private collections and to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Silver shows how the illicit trade of stolen antiquities implicates the art world’s most prestigious institutions. He takes us alongside detectives and reporters who doggedly pursue elusive treasures across decades and continents, chasing leads to Switzerland, Beirut…and Malibu. Millions are made while laws — and irreplaceable artworks — are broken.
Providence Journal: “Vernon Silver’s fascinating account”
Link: ProJo: The Lost Chalice
...a world of incredible secrecy, where art rises into view only to disappear for decades, where sales are anonymous, museum officials turn blind eyes, and where beauty is measured in dollars and euros.
The New York Times: A Greek Urn’s Underworld
Link: Stolen Beauty: A Greek Urn’s Underworld
“The Lost Chalice: The Epic Hunt for a Priceless Masterpiece,” just published by William Morrow, makes a first-class page turner out of the stolen krater’s travels from ancient Greece to Etruscan Italy to New York and then back here — and of the travails of another work also by the sublime Euphronios, a kylix, or chalice, which was looted from the same spot here in Cerveteri, a town northwest of Rome.
Vernon Silver, a 40-year-old American journalist and a doctoral student in archaeology at Oxford, wrote the book. “This is the whole illicit antiquities trade writ small,” he said a few days ago. “The two works started out in the hands of the same Greek artist, 2,500 years ago, ended up going through the same shady Italian dealer by different routes to America, one the public route, the other underground, and both end up back here in Italy.”
The tale is one neither Met officials nor Italian authorities will be pleased to find so conscientiously recounted.
Sharon Waxman, author of Loot
Link: Sharon Waxman, author of Loot on The Lost Chalice
“Setting up his tale as a mystery to be solved Silver takes a micro approach to a great big problem, that of looted antiquities in modern times... a welcome glimpse into the modern, secret journey of such ancient objects.”
Kirkus Reviews
“Vernon's sharply rendered account is engrossing. A densely packed, dizzyingly detailed tale of art and espionage.”
Thomas Hoving, former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
“In his brilliant The Lost Chalice Vernon Silver has gone far beyond merely slicing open the Gordion knot obscuring the world-famous ancient Greek chalices made by Euphronios, the Leonardo of the 6th century BC, he has patiently untied that knot in a spine-tingling read.”
James L. Swanson, author of Manhunt
Vernon Silver has written an utterly compelling, page-turner of a book. The Lost Chalice is a riveting story of tomb robbers and antiquities smugglers, high-stakes auctioneers and the princely chiefs of the world’s most prestigious museums—all vying to get their hands on an ancient masterpiece. It’s a terrific read, from start to finish.
Publishers Weekly
Link: Publishers Weekly
“A captivating tale of ancient art as a modern hot commodity... Silver’s telling is infused with an infectious curiosity about the illicit art trade and an equally infectious appreciation of the art itself. ”