When the great and the good gathered over champagne and canapes at the British Museum for this year’s Museum of the Year awards barely two months ago, the hosts could be forgiven for feeling self-satisfied.
The choice of the British Museum’s glass-roofed Great Court as the venue pushed the point home that, regardless of who might win on the night, the venerable Bloomsbury institution – known to many just as the BM – remained first among equals. But little did they know it was all about to come crashing down after allegations surfaced that thousands of objects had been stolen from under its nose.
