Police in Poland have found the stolen "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign, taken from the entrance to the former Nazi death camp at Auschwitz.
The metal sign, which was taken in the early hours of Friday morning, was cut into three pieces, officials said in a statement early on Monday.
Five people have been detained in connection with the theft, police said.
The theft of the infamous sign had sparked outrage around the world and the Polish government had made its recovery a top national priority.
Officials had also appealed to international police organisations Iterpol and Europol for help.
The sign's motto – which translates as "work makes you free" – has become a symbol of the cynical brutality of the Nazi regime.
More than 1 million people, mostly Jews, but also Gypsies, Poles and others, died at Auschwitz – most of them executed in gas chambers or worked to death in the camp's factories.
The five metre sign was reportedly recovered following a raid in northern Poland late on Sunday.
The sign had been cut into three pieces, one for each word.
No details have yet been released on the circumstances in which the sign was found or the possible motive for the theft.
More information is expected to be announced at a police press conference in the city of Krakow scheduled for Monday morning.
The director of the Auschwitz museum said at the weekend that urgent renovation work on the camp's crumbling buildings meant the museum had to make do with a rudimentary security system.
"The surveillance was concentrated on the archives and exhibited objects, because no sane person could have imagined such an act," Piotr Cywinski told the AFP news agency.
"The camp entrance, from where the sign was stolen, was being monitored by just one camera, an old model. Moreover the snow meant the image was blurred."
Source: Agencies
The metal sign, which was taken in the early hours of Friday morning, was cut into three pieces, officials said in a statement early on Monday.
Five people have been detained in connection with the theft, police said.
The theft of the infamous sign had sparked outrage around the world and the Polish government had made its recovery a top national priority.
Officials had also appealed to international police organisations Iterpol and Europol for help.
The sign's motto – which translates as "work makes you free" – has become a symbol of the cynical brutality of the Nazi regime.
More than 1 million people, mostly Jews, but also Gypsies, Poles and others, died at Auschwitz – most of them executed in gas chambers or worked to death in the camp's factories.
The five metre sign was reportedly recovered following a raid in northern Poland late on Sunday.
The sign had been cut into three pieces, one for each word.
No details have yet been released on the circumstances in which the sign was found or the possible motive for the theft.
More information is expected to be announced at a police press conference in the city of Krakow scheduled for Monday morning.
The director of the Auschwitz museum said at the weekend that urgent renovation work on the camp's crumbling buildings meant the museum had to make do with a rudimentary security system.
"The surveillance was concentrated on the archives and exhibited objects, because no sane person could have imagined such an act," Piotr Cywinski told the AFP news agency.
"The camp entrance, from where the sign was stolen, was being monitored by just one camera, an old model. Moreover the snow meant the image was blurred."
Source: Agencies
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