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Police are searching for the bold thieves who made off with priceless diamonds and other historic treasures from the Grünes Gewölbe or "Green Vault" state museum in Dresden, Germany, early Monday. 

The museum has a large collection of jewels, Baroque artifacts and intricately crafted golden tableaus amassed between 1723 and 1730 by August the Strong, the Saxon elector and arts patron who later became king of Poland. 

Early reports of the heist sparked incredulity and worries about how much was taken, since the historic Green Vault collection includes thousands of rare and irreplaceable items. The loot's material value seems to have fallen short of the $1 billion initially reported by some German news outlets, but Marion Ackermann, general director of the State Art Collection in Dresden, said the pilfered items have priceless cultural value. 

Police in Dresden say the heist took just minutes, and that the thieves targeted three vitrines, or display cases, in the museum's "Jewel Room." Surveillance video shows two black-clad people rushing into the room and using what looks to be a hatchet or small axe to smash the glass displays, viciously forcing their way into the finely crafted cases. The scene takes place in darkness, with the room's ornate walls and polished checkerboard floor illuminated only by the infiltrators' flashlights.

"We are shocked by the brutality of the burglary," Ackermann said, according to 

The criminals got into the Green Vault by breaking a security grill and window in the historic royal palace that houses the museum, police said at a news conference held around 1 p.m. local time.

Saxony's art minister, Eva-Maria Stange, 

 that the stolen jewelry pieces are essentially the crown jewels of Saxon kings. "They belong to Saxony," she said.

As NPR's Rob Schmitz reports from Berlin, one of the museum's most prized possessions is safe.

"One of the museum's best known treasures, the 41-carat Dresden Green Diamond, happened to be away on loan to New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art at the time of the break-in," Schmitz says. "Other exhibits include a table-sized sculpture of the Indian royal court made of gold, silver and precious stones, as well as a golden coffee service by an 18th century court jeweler."

Details of the heist are still emerging, as police investigate and look for the perpetrators. Saxony's police say they believe the thieves fled the scene in an Audi A6 sedan — and that an identical vehicle was later found on fire in an underground parking lot. 

Laying out a timeline on its Twitter feed, the museum's parent organization, the Dresden State Art Collections, says the first police car was called to the building at 5:04 a.m. local time. Within a minute, a report emerged of an escape vehicle, setting off an intense search in the city. Around the same time, officials realized there had been a power failure in the museum's section of Dresden.

Soon afterward, an electrical control box nearby was found to be disabled — and authorities are still working to determine whether that might have been the result of sabotage.  While initial reports suggested the power might have been cut to the museum's security systems, 

 that the outage had affected street lights in the area of the crime scene.

News of the heist was startling, given the museum's status as one of Europe's largest collections of jewels and European artistry. And the break-in triggered strong personal feelings in Saxony, where the museum serves as a repository of a cultural identity that goes back centuries. 

In response to the intrusion, Saxony Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer said, "Not only the state art collections were robbed, but we Saxons!" 

Referring to the wider significance of the valuable treasures held in the Grünes Gewölbe, Kretschmer said the history of Saxony cannot be understood without the Green Vault.

Saxony Interior Minister Roland Wöller said it's a "bitter day" for the state's heritage, adding that the criminals had stolen "treasures of unimaginable value." As of now, he added, officials are assuming the burglars knew precisely what they wanted to take, and how to get it. 

The police acknowledged that the theft is 

 for many Saxons, but they also urged people not to speculate about details of the crime, or who might be to blame.

The treasures of the Grünes Gewölbe have been part of Dresden and Saxony's resurgence from the ravages of World War II and the Cold War. The pieces survived U.S. and British allies' relentless bombing of Dresden, only to be seized by the Soviet Union. They were later returned to East Germany, but the full breadth of the collection's thousands of pieces wasn't put on public display until around 15 years ago, 

The Green Vault theft comes two years after another German museum was the victim of a shocking high-profile heist: In March of 2017, thieves crept into an upper window of the Bode Museum in Berlin before smashing a bulletproof case and grabbing a 

 worth an estimated $4.3 million. Four suspects in that case went on trial in January, in a process that 

Crime, Law and Justice

Bill Chappell

Author

Saxony's art minister, Eva-Maria Stange, noted that the stolen jewelry pieces are essentially the crown jewels of Saxon kings. "They belong to Saxony," she said.

Thieves steal priceless diamonds in heist at Dresden's 'Green Vault' museum

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