Chap­ter 4 takes read­ers through the for­ma­tive years of Stéphane Guil­laume Frédéric Bre­itwieser, offer­ing insights into his ear­ly fas­ci­na­tion with his­to­ry and arti­facts. This pas­sion was ignit­ed by his grandfather’s fre­quent expe­di­tions, dur­ing which they searched for pot­tery shards and arrow­heads, relics of a bygone era. Grow­ing up in Alsace, a region con­stant­ly nav­i­gat­ing its com­plex his­tor­i­cal iden­ti­ty between French and Ger­man influ­ences, Breitwieser’s child­hood adven­tures would become the cor­ner­stone of his life­long obses­sion with antiq­ui­ties. His con­nec­tion to the past, which began with these child­hood excur­sions, evolved into an over­whelm­ing com­pul­sion for his­tor­i­cal objects.

Raised in the small French town of Wit­ten­heim, Bre­itwieser lived in a house­hold where art and antiques were woven into the very fab­ric of his upbring­ing. The house was filled with relics, includ­ing paint­ings by the cel­e­brat­ed Alsa­t­ian expres­sion­ist Robert Bre­itwieser, a dis­tant rel­a­tive. This envi­ron­ment, steeped in cul­tur­al and artis­tic sig­nif­i­cance, cul­ti­vat­ed in him a deep rev­er­ence for his­to­ry, though it also accen­tu­at­ed his feel­ings of inad­e­qua­cy. As the only grand­child in the fam­i­ly, Bre­itwieser was show­ered with affec­tion and mate­r­i­al pos­ses­sions, includ­ing coins, tools, and oth­er his­tor­i­cal items. These gifts, how­ev­er, did lit­tle to alle­vi­ate the grow­ing emo­tion­al dis­tance he felt from his peers. The oth­er chil­dren in his town were drawn to mod­ern forms of enter­tain­ment, while Bre­itwieser, instead, immersed him­self in the world of arti­facts. Over time, this left him iso­lat­ed, strug­gling with social anx­i­ety and depres­sion, feel­ing dis­con­nect­ed from his con­tem­po­raries.

At home, the dis­cord between Bre­itwieser and his author­i­tar­i­an father added to the ten­sion in the house­hold. His father’s dom­i­neer­ing pres­ence only exac­er­bat­ed the emo­tion­al tur­moil, espe­cial­ly as argu­ments became more fre­quent and intense. These strained dynam­ics were inten­si­fied when his father left short­ly after Bre­itwieser grad­u­at­ed in 1991, lead­ing to a dra­mat­ic shift in their finan­cial cir­cum­stances. With his father’s depar­ture, Bre­itwieser faced a new kind of hardship—one that was not only finan­cial but emo­tion­al as well. This shift in lifestyle, com­bined with his inter­nal tur­moil, led him to a destruc­tive cop­ing mech­a­nism: shoplift­ing. What began as minor inci­dents soon esca­lat­ed, as he sought a way to regain con­trol over his increas­ing­ly chaot­ic life. His encoun­ters with law enforce­ment were minor but marked the begin­ning of a much dark­er path that would define his adult years.

In the midst of these per­son­al upheavals, Bre­itwieser found an unex­pect­ed solace in the world of muse­ums and gal­leries. The qui­et con­tem­pla­tion offered by these spaces allowed him to escape from the pres­sures of dai­ly life. Unlike most vis­i­tors who viewed the exhibits from a dis­tance, he felt a per­son­al con­nec­tion to the objects on dis­play. For him, the idea of own­ing these arti­facts took on a more pro­found mean­ing. His first theft, which involved a small met­al piece from an ancient Roman cof­fin, seemed less like a crime and more like a means of pre­serv­ing his­to­ry. In his mind, these arti­facts were his to pro­tect and cher­ish, rather than be locked away in a muse­um.

As his obses­sion with col­lect­ing grew stronger, Bre­itwieser began to jus­ti­fy his actions with an increas­ing­ly con­vo­lut­ed ratio­nale. To him, the theft of art and relics was a nec­es­sary act, a preser­va­tion of his­to­ry that mod­ern soci­ety failed to appre­ci­ate. Unlike typ­i­cal crim­i­nals, who might steal for finan­cial gain, Bre­itwieser was dri­ven by a desire to own tan­gi­ble pieces of the past. This com­pul­sion brought him a sense of ful­fill­ment that he was unable to find in human rela­tion­ships. His grow­ing col­lec­tion, though illic­it, offered him a sense of pow­er and con­trol that the rest of his life lacked. Yet, just as his iso­lat­ed exis­tence seemed unbreak­able, a roman­tic rela­tion­ship entered his life, chal­leng­ing his world­view in unex­pect­ed ways. The emer­gence of love added a new lay­er of com­plex­i­ty to his char­ac­ter, shift­ing his pri­or­i­ties and set­ting the stage for a deep­er explo­ration of his moti­va­tions and desires in the nar­ra­tive that fol­lows.

Through these expe­ri­ences, Chap­ter 4 paints a por­trait of a man whose love for his­to­ry and art grad­u­al­ly trans­forms into an obses­sion. What begins as an inno­cent fas­ci­na­tion with relics and arti­facts becomes a dri­ving force that shapes his iden­ti­ty and actions. The chap­ter not only explores Breitwieser’s ear­ly influ­ences but also delves into the emo­tion­al strug­gles that accom­pa­ny his devel­op­ment. As the sto­ry unfolds, his char­ac­ter con­tin­ues to evolve, offer­ing a unique glimpse into the mind of some­one whose desire for art and his­to­ry leads him down a path of theft and deceit. The com­plex­i­ties of his char­ac­ter, marked by con­tra­dic­tions and emo­tion­al depth, ensure that his jour­ney is one that will cap­ti­vate read­ers as it con­tin­ues to unrav­el.