Four survivors of the Holocaust have found jewellery and other precious objects which they and other prisoners buried some 62 years ago near Majdanek death camp in eastern Poland, the head of the camp's museum said on Tuesday.
"Four survivors - Polish Jews who were sent to Majdanek by the Germans after the Warsaw ghetto uprising in the spring of 1943 - were able to indicate the place where they and their loved ones hid valuable personal possessions," said museum director Edward Balawajder.
The find was made when the four elderly survivors were taking part in the making of a documentary film about Majdanek, for which the New York-based filmmakers had brought four Holocaust survivors from Australia to Poland.
"An archaeological dig allowed us to find, around 35 centimetres below the surface, some 50 objects: rings, wedding rings, watches, earrings, and coins, including a $10 coin minted in 1894," said Balawajder.
One survivor, now 82, "was able to pinpoint the place where some 2 000 prisoners waited for more than one day before the 'selection' which saw most of them sent to the gas chambers," the museum's historian, Tomasz Kranz, said.
"It was during that long wait that they probably hid their belongings."
An archaeologist from Israel took part in the dig over three days late last month. The museum hopes to resume the dig next spring.
The former death camp inmates were unable to recognise which of the objects might have belonged to them or their families. The Majdanek museum has agreed to classify the items and put them on display to the public.
"It's a real treasure, not only because of its financial worth but because it is proof of the tragedy which occurred in the death camps," said Balawajder.
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