What was stolen from the Louvre? Police hunt thieves after daring daytime heist

Thieves who broke into Paris' Louvre Museum made off with priceless Napoleonic jewelry including diamond encrusted crowns, tiaras necklaces and earings.

The daring daylight heist at Paris' Louvre Museum was over in minutes, but it's feared the priceless Napoleonic jewelry taken by a masked gang in Sunday's brazen raid could be lost forever.

After riding on a cherry picker up the museum's facade, the thieves forced open a window about 30 minutes after the museum opened and smashed up display cases in the gilded Galerie d’Apollon where the Crown diamonds from France's long defunct royal families are displayed.

It is not the first time the gallery has been targeted. In December 1976, masked thieves entered the same room through the same window to steal a 19th-century jeweled sword belonging to French King Charles X. It has never been recovered.

After Sunday's smash-and-grab robbery, the gang, which remained at large, escaped the world’s most-visited museum on motorbikes, making off with nine items, including a crown, a tiara, necklaces and earrings.

Here, NBC News looks at what was stolen.