Malta seeking rare shark tooth given as gift to Prince George

Prince George, the 7-year-old future king of the United Kingdom, is having to learn a difficult lesson about what happens when he and other members of the royal family are gifted rare objects that have to be repatriated to their countries of origin.

George is at the center of a diplomatic fuss after beloved British environmentalist Sir David Attenborough gave him a prehistoric shark tooth he said he found while on a family vacation to Malta more than 50 years ago, the Guardian reported.

Officials in Malta, a former British colony, want to investigate whether the son of Prince William and Kate Middleton should return the historic artifact to the island nation so that it can be displayed in a museum there, the Times of Malta reported. The Maltese culture minister, Jose Herrera, has pledged to investigate the provenance of the fossilized tooth, which is about 23 million years old.

“There are some artifacts that are important to Maltese natural heritage, which ended up abroad and deserve to be retrieved,” Herrera told the Times of Malta.

The fuss over the tooth began after Kensington Palace posted cute photos over the weekend, showing a delighted George with his new gift. Attenborough made the kind gesture to the young prince while for a private viewing of his new environmental documentary, “A Life on Our Planet.”

The tooth was found embedded in yellow limestone and is believed to have once belonged to an extinct species of giant shark that could grow up to 52 feet long, the Times of Malta reported. Under the laws of Malta, fossils are considered to be objects of “geological importance,” and their excavation or removal from the country is forbidden, the Times said.

The royal family has long been called on to return famous items that came into their possession through plunder by explorers and soldiers or acquired through colonization, the Guardian reported. One of those items is the Kohi-Noor diamond, which is part of the crown jewels and is been on display in the Tower of London.

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