ROME: A bronze statue of a dancing Greek satyr, which is believed to be 2,400 years old, went on display here on Monday amid controversy over what it is worth and who it really belongs to.

Fishermen netted the statue, known as the dancing satyr because of its leaping position and wide “ecstatic” eyes, in international waters between Sicily and Tunisia in 1998.

A team of 30 Italian restoration experts have spent five years picking the barnacles from the statue by hand, attaching a leg that was found subsequently on the same seabed and polishing the bronze.

Experts believe the statue, which is missing both arms and its other leg, might have been part of group of satyrs and maenads (frenzied women) in mid-orgy around a statue of Dionysus, the god of wine.

A historian, Paolo Romano, believes it may be the work of Praxiteles, one of ancient Greece’s most popular sculptors.

Captain Francesco Adragna said he and his crew pulled up the statue by chance along with a haul of shrimps, during a routine fishing expedition.

Italy’s culture ministry said Tunisia has also claimed ownership of the statue.—Dawn/The Guardian News Service.