Elgin Marbles

''The Parthenon Marbles'', often called the '''Elgin Marbles''', is a large collection of Marble Sculpture s brought to Britain in 1806 by Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl Of Elgin , ambassador to the Ottoman Empire in between 1799-1803. Taking advantange of the status of Greece as an occupied country, he obtained a ''firman'' for their removal from the Parthenon from the Sultan , the occupiers of Greece since 1450. The sculptures were deposited in the British Museum , London in 1816, and in 1936 were placed into the purpose-built Duveen Gallery.

DESCRIPTION

The Parthenon Marbles include some of the statuary from the , reduced to ruin during the Greek War Of Independence (1821-33); the Propylaia , and the Temple Of Athena Nike . Lord Elgin took half of the marbles from the Parthenon and wax casts were produced from the remaining ones.

INTERPRETATION OF THE FRIEZE

At present, about two-thirds of the frieze is in London and a third remains in Athens. Much of the Athenian material is not on display, and there are fragments in nine other international museums. Considerable debate surrounds the meaning of the frieze but most agree that it depicts the Panathenaic procession that paraded through Athens every four years. The procession on the frieze culminates at the east end of the Parthenon in a depiction of the Greek Gods who are seated mainly on stools, either side of temple servants in their midst. This section of the frieze is currently under-appreciated as it is split between London and Athens, a doorway in the British Museum masking the absence of the relevant section of Frieze. An almost complete copy of this section of the Frieze is displayed and open to the public at Hammerwood Park near East Grinstead in Sussex .

CRITICISM BY ELGIN'S CONTEMPORARIES

When the marbles were shipped to Britain, there was criticism of Elgin (who had spent a fortune on the project) but also much admiration of the sculptures. Lord Byron strongly objected to their removal from Greece :

Dull is the eye that will not weep to see

Thy walls defaced, thy mouldering shrines removed

By British hands, which it had best behoved

To guard those relics ne’er to be restored.

:::—"Childe Harold's Pilgrimage"

Byron was not the only Englishman to protest the removal at the time:
:"The Honourable Lord has taken advantage of the most unjustifiable means and has committed the most flagrant pillages. It was, it seems, fatal that a representative of our country loot those objects that the Turks and other barbarians had considered sacred,"
said Sir John Newport, a contemporary MP. Thomas Hughes, an eye witness, later wrote:
:"The abduction of small parts of the Parthenon, of a value relatively small but which previously contributed to the solidity of the building, left that glorious edifice exposed to premature ruin and degradation. The abduction dislodged from their original positions, wherefrom they precisely drew their interest and beauty, many pieces which are altogether unnecessary to the country that now owns them."

John Keats was one of those who saw them privately exhibited in London, hence his two Sonnet s about the marbles. Some scholars, notably Richard Payne Knight , insisted that the marbles dated from the period of the Roman Empire , but most accepted that they were authentic works from the studio of Phidias , the most famous ancient Greek sculptor. They were eventually purchased by Parliament for the nation in 1816 for £35,000 and deposited in the British Museum , where they were displayed in the Elgin Saloon (constructed in 1832 ), until the Duveen Gallery was completed in 1939 .

DAMAGE TO MARBLES

To facilitate transport, the column capital of the Parthenon, the Erechtheum cornice and many metopes and slabs were sawn and sliced into smaller sections. One shipload of marbles sank off Cape Matapan , but was salvaged at the Earl's expense; it took two years to bring them to the surface. {Link without Title}

The artifacts have been irrevocably damaged by the unauthorised "cleaning" methods employed by British Museum staff in the 1930s, who were dismissed when this was discovered. Acting under the erroneous belief that the marbles were originally bright white, the marbles were cleaned with copper tools and caustics, causing serious damage and altering the marbles' coloring. (The Pentelicon marble on which the carvings were made naturally acquire a tan color similar to honey when exposed to air.) In addition, the process scraped away all traces of surface coloring that the marbles originally held.

The Greeks applied similar processes to other buildings remaining on the Acropolis in the 1950s. The works remaining in Greece have been damaged mostly by the polluted Athenian atmosphere. The Marbles have also been damaged by the damp London climate.

THE GREEK CLAIM TO THE MARBLES

The Greek government claims that the marbles should be returned to Athens on moral grounds, although it is no longer feasible or advisable to reposition them onto the Parthenon. As part of the campaign, it is building the New Acropolis Museum , designed by the Swiss/American architect Bernard Tschumi , designed to hold the Parthenon sculptures arranged in the same way as they would have been on the Parthenon. It is intended to leave the spaces for the Parthenon Marbles empty, rather than using casts in these positions, as a reminder to visitors of the fact that parts are held in other museums.

OTHER DISPLACED PARTHENON ART

Lord Elgin was neither the first, nor the last, to disperse elements of the marbles from their original location. The remainder of the surviving sculptures that are not in museums or storerooms in Athens are held in museums in various locations across Europe. The British Museum also holds additional fragments from the Parthenon sculptures acquired from various collections that have no connection with Lord Elgin.

FURTHER READING

Christopher Hitchens , ''The Elgin Marbles: Should they be returned to Greece?'' (with essays by Robert Browning and Graham Binns) (Verso, March 1998)