Marble Bust From Goodwill is from Ancient Rome

Bargain hunters should be on the lookout when rummaging through Goodwill or any other thrift store. You may end up with a rare piece of world history in your living room. Sounds crazy, right? Well that's exactly what happened to Laura Young who purchased a genuine Roman bust from Goodwill. Her cost? $35. Chantal Da Silva at NBC News has more.

Laura Young, a Texas antiques dealer, thought she had found a steal when she came across a stunning statue at a Goodwill store in 2018 for just under $35. And while she suspected she had come across something "very special," little did she know the piece would turn out to be a priceless Roman bust dating back to 2,000 years.

When she first came across the bust, scouring for antique treasures in the Goodwill store, one of Young's first thoughts was: "He looked Roman. He looked old." And once she purchased the statue, she told the San Antonio Express-News, "in the sunlight, it looked like something that could be very, very special."

Special, indeed. A Sotheby's consultant eventually determined that the $35 sculpture was in fact a marble Julio-Claudian-era Roman bust.

NBC News

According to historians, the bust had gone missing during WWII. There is no way to determine how it ended up in a Texas Goodwill, nor who had posession of it prior to it landing there. Young reached out to the German government, as it was originally there, and it will be returned. But part of the agreement is that it is put on display at the San Antonio Museum of Art beforehand.

As the saying goes: one person's trash is another person's historical artifact.