THE HAGUE, May 14 -- Parts of priceless porcelain Meissen tableware, which may have been stolen from a German Jewish family by the Nazis, have been located in Dutch museums, local newspaper De Telegraaf reported Wednesday.

The plates and sauce boats are part of a 435-piece crockery set that Stadtholder Willem V, head of state of the Republic of the Netherlands at that time, received as a gift from the Dutch East Indies Company in 1774.

A total of 26 parts of the collection were later bought by the German-Jewish banking family Gutmann. Under pressure from the Nazis, the pieces were auctioned in April 1934.

Dutch Art and antiquities research agency Artiaz now claims it has traced 15 of the crockery items, based on old auction documents.

According to Artiaz, six of them are now part of the collection at the former royal Palace Het Loo in Apeldoorn, now a national museum, and six pieces are at the Zuiderzee Museum in Enkhuizen.

In addition, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, the Regional Museum in Tiel and the Historical Museum in Deventer possess one piece each of the crockery set.

The Palace Het Loo foundation and the Rijksmuseum told De Telegraaf that it took the case seriously and would start an investigation.

Works of art which former owners lost possession of because of theft, confiscation or enforced sale during the Nazi regime may now be owned by the state of the Netherlands, a provincial/local government institution, a foundation or a private individual. These pieces are considered as stolen and since early 2002, a claim to this stolen work of art can be submitted to the Dutch Restitutions Committee, which advises in such cases.

"We expect the Gutmann family to order us to contact the Dutch state and the Restitutions Committee, so the pieces can hopefully be returned to the family," Beate Schreiber, from the Berlin-based Facts and Files firm that represents the family, said.