Sometime around 9, Aug. 17 -- The call came late Sunday morning, and museum director Marisa Mercurio could not find the words to describe what Messina had just lost. "We are devastated by what happened," she said. "They were two of Antonello da Messina's most important and best-known works."

50 p.m. on Saturday, while the city's center was still warm with the last of the Ferragosto crowds, a team of thieves made their way along Viale Annunziata to the perimeter of the MuMe Regional Interdisciplinary Museum. What followed was swift and practiced: metal fencing cut, a side door forced open, an armored glass display case breached. By the time cultural officials went public on Sunday morning, four Renaissance works by Antonello da Messina, v...