Name: Historic jewels stolen from Louvre: BBC Learning English from the News
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From BBC Learning English this is Learning English from the News, our podcast about the news headlines in this program, thieves steal jewellery from the Louvre Museum in Paris.

In this program, we look at one big news story and the vocabulary in the headlines that will help you understand it.

You can find all the vocabulary and headlines from this episode as well as a worksheet on our website.

BBC Learning English so Phil, let's hear more about this story.

Thieves broke into the Louvre Museum in Paris on Sunday morning and stole eight extremely valuable items of jewelry.

The robbers used power tools to break into the museum, which is the famous home of the Mona Lisa painting.

The thieves escaped on scooters and took items, including tiaras and necklaces, that had belonged to French royalty or or imperial rulers.

The entire break in took about seven minutes.

Let's have our first headline and this is from the New York Times.

In just seven brazen minutes, thieves grab priceless jewels from Louvre.

That headline again from the New York Times, a newspaper in the US in just seven brazen minutes, thieves grab priceless jewels from Louvre.

So this headline talks about the short time it took thieves to steal the jewellery.

But we're interested in the description of the jewels as priceless.

Now, price makes me think that this has something to do with the cost of the jewels.

Priceless means that something is very, very valuable.

The jewels that were stolen from the Louvre were very valuable.

It's a bit confusing because the suffix less might make you think that the jewels have no price because they're not worth anything.

But actually it means they have no price because they're so valuable a price couldn't be calculated for them.

You'll often see prices used to describe things like art or historical artifacts because they are rare and unique.

We might think that this means that something is not very valuable, but

actually it means something is so valuable a value couldn't be calculated for it.

We can also use priceless informally in quite a different way.

If we describe a joke story or event as priceless, we mean it's very amusing.

For example, his house is filled with priceless artworks.

This is Learning English on the News, our podcast about the news headlines.

Today we're talking about the break in at the Louvre Museum in Paris.

The robbery at the Louvre happened on Sunday morning just after the museum opened.

The Thieves used a ladder to climb onto a balcony at the museum and power tools to break in.

Tourists were evacuated from the building and the museum was closed on Sunday and Monday.

Our next headline is about the timing of the robbery.

And this is from the Times, a British newspaper.

Louvreist Thieves Steal Crown jewels in daylight burglary.

Louvre Heist Thieves Steal crown jewels in daylight burglary.

So this headline mentions the heist at the Louvre.

We're looking at the phrase daylight burglary.

Daylight literally means the light from the sun that we get during the daytime, but

it can also refer to the period of time when it's light the day.

And burglary means breaking into a property to steal something.

So literally, daylight burglary just means a theft that happened during the daytime.

The headline is emphasising that this is a shocking crime.

We might expect a burglary to happen at night when it's dark and there are fewer people around, but

these thieves chose to break in during the day when they could be easily seen.

Now, there's a very similar phrase to daylight burglary that we use in English quite often, isn't there?

We can describe something as daylight robbery to say that it's unreasonably expensive.

For example, I bought a takeaway coffee this morning and they charged me an extra £1 for the cup.

Now, the cafe aren't literally stealing from you, but

the expensive cup makes you feel like you've paid too much and this is unfair.

There we've had burglary, breaking into a property to steal something, for example.

There have been lots of burglaries in my neighborhood recently.

I think I'm going to get an alarm installed.

This is Learning English from the News from BBC.

We're talking about the expensive jewelry that has been stolen from the Louvre in Paris.

French authorities are searching for the thieves, but

the French Justice Minister, Gerald d' Armanan has said that if the thieves are not caught quickly, it is unlikely that the stolen jewelry will be found.

This is because many of the jewels are covered with hundreds of diamonds and precious stones and they can easily be broken into smaller parts and sold separately.

Our next headline is about the search for the thieves and the stolen jewelry.

Race against time as police try to recover priceless jewels from Louvre as authorities reveal details of Daring raid.

And that headline again from Sky News, Race against time as police try to recover priceless jewels from Louvre as authorities reveal details of daring raid.

This headline describes the search for the stolen jewels as a race against time.

Well, race against time is an expression which means that there's only a short amount of time left to do something, right?

In this story, police think that the thieves will quickly break apart the jewels they've stolen and sell them.

So police want to find the thieves quickly before they have a chance to do this.

We commonly hear this expression in stories about crime and policing, but

we might also hear it used to describe any situation where there's a time pressure.

For example, after a natural disaster like a flood, emergency services are in a race against time to rescue survivors.

A note on Using this phrase, you can describe a situation as a race against time or someone can be in a race against time.

We had race against time, a situation where there's only a limited amount of time to do something.

For example, the town only has a few hours to prepare for the big storm.

That's it for this episode of Learning English from the News.

We'll be back next week with another news story.

Now test what you've learnt using the worksheet on our website bbclearningenglish.com and you can also follow us on social media.

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