Do those damn Greeks really own the Elgin marbles?

[Ed]

Not just those but the Kalix Krater at the Met and a plethora of other stuff.

The question is: Does the human patrimony belong to the country of origen or those that can best take care of it (them)?

I have mixed feelings on the subject but tend to come out on the side of preservation. The marbles of the title of this thread would have melted had they been left in place (witness the karadides sp?) and, frankly, once a country demonstrates that kind of indifference/inability regarding their care, they have lost title forever, IMO.

[JamesM]

We didn't do a very good job with preserving the Elgin Marbles, though. It's pretty lucky it wasn't 'improved' to have a Union Flag backdrop to the entire thing, with any female profile changed to that of Queen Victoria. Didn't we cheat to get our hands on the marbles anyway?

If, for example, the Germans had won WWII and walked off with Nelson's Column, we'd probably want it back, so I can understand why the Greeks might feel the same about the Elgin Marbles.

[Cleopatra]

Parthenon, where the Greek Marbles came from was the product of a civilization that could be nothing else but Greek BUT Parthenon and therefore the Marbles do not belong to the Greeks only for sure.

They belong to Humanity.

Have you ever experienced the light of Athens? The very light that Lord Byron has described as the cruelest light of all, the light that reveals all the sins and consoles all the tragedies?

Probably you haven't.

Well, the Marbles can shine for the shake of Humanity only under this absolute light, that's why they have to shine under the sky that gave birth to them.

The Greek Sky :)

[CapelDodger]

Hi Cleopatra:
Well, the Marbles can shine for the shake of Humanity only under this absolute light, that's why they have to shine under the sky that gave birth to them.
But it'll be necessary to take a lot of crap out of the air first. Hardly a bad thing in itself, of course.

The Marbles should go back to Greece, in my opinion. Past neglect (which was Turkish rather than Greek) is hardly likely to be repeated.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by CapelDodger
Hi Cleopatra:

But it'll be necessary to take a lot of crap out of the air first. Hardly a bad thing in itself, of course.

The Marbles should go back to Greece, in my opinion. Past neglect (which was Turkish rather than Greek) is hardly likely to be repeated.

Good evening Capel Dodger.

You will be glad to know that you are wrong :)

We are building the most beautiful museum in the world that it will be ready in a couple of months to host the most bright pages of human civilization :)

Be certain that in the room of Marbles of the New Acropolis Museum,we won't hold decadent receptions of decadent British rich the way you did in the British Museum...

Capel Dodger, funny.

I have never asked you but after reading your post I don't really need to; you have never been to Greece... hmmmmm.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Have you ever experienced the light of Athens?


No, but I've heard about their acid rain.

[Cleopatra]

Ed if it wasn't for you and this forum I wouldn't have heard about it...

Acid rain?

Please....

[CapelDodger]

Hi Cleopatra:
We are building the most beautiful museum in the world that it will be ready in a couple of months to host the most bright pages of human civilization
I've heard about that, and it is, of course, the reason why the "they can't take care of them" argument doesn't fly. I thought you were advocating putting them outdoors - "under the Greek sun" - and I've heard bad things about the Athens air. (You're right, I've never been to Greece. I don't travel well.)

[Cleopatra]

Yes the pollution is bad indeed. That's why we have removed all the sculptures from Parthenon and Erectheion ( The Karyadides come from Erecthteion) to the Acropolis Museum.

Allow me to insist about the light and the new museum because it will be something really special.

Our old Museum on the rock of the Acropolis was built after the fashion of the Museums of the 19th ce. It's like the British Museum.The exhibits are lighten by artificial light.

The New Museum will be lighten by huge atriums and yes, it will be open in the Full Moon nights as well !( at least as long as the Moon is safe from the felines...)

I am particular interested in that because part of my interests is how light is used in Art and in Architecture.

Did you know that the Ancient Tragedies were performed during the day under the Athenian hot sun?

This must tell you a lot about our culture...

[kittynh]

An American/French/Scottish family take....

So, I drag Pool Boy to the British Museum and he is really upset.

First off, all the Egyptian stuff. He was pratically shouting, "DId they leave ANYTHING in Egypt!!!" and "Why don't the Egyptians ask for it back?"

He'd never heard of the "Elgin Marbles". I told him the whole REAL history, not the Brit Museum version. Hey, they didn't look nearly so broken and old before the Brits decided to "save them". Should also be noted that the money to buy them from Lord Elgin wasn't just voted without quite a bit of trouble to start with. Even when the British government purchased them many Brits disagreed with their purchase and wished them returned. They've built a really nice and what seems to be NEW area to exhibit the marbles. That kind of pissed me off. Seems like they aren't going to give them up anytime soon after spending all that money.

Pool Boy was ready to donate to the Greek terrorists who would be glad to steal them back ("If they kidnapped Prince Charles, and ransomed him for the marbles, do you think the British would trade?" answer, NO) He was so MAD.

[kittynh]

I was part of an effort by Native Americans in Wisconsin to have religious articles residing in museums returned to them. The different tribes made beautiful replicas to replace the items in the museums, and lovingly placed the items in their newer casino financed museums. Many small museums have items of historical and religious interest that were donated by people who had travelled out West. Most of the museums have been very nice, and gladly traded old for new replica. The Native tribes have been very happy that these items were cared for by other museums until the tribes built their own museums. It really means a lot to these people to have their own history back home though, where they can share it with their children.

So, how about some replicas?

[CapelDodger]

Hi Cleopatra:
The New Museum will be lighten by huge atriums and yes, it will be open in the Full Moon nights as well !( at least as long as the Moon is safe from the felines...)
That'll be something to see. But it's not cats you have to worry about; Fenris the Wolf is the one that's going to eat the moon at Ragnorak/Armageddon/Gulf War 3. (I can't remember what the Greek version is, or even if there is one.)

from kittynh:
They've built a really nice and what seems to be NEW area to exhibit the marbles.
A source of much annoyance, given the limited budget. It's an attempt to "create facts" in my judgement. Part of the problem is that some people have spent their careers creating arguments why the Marbles shouldn't be returned and by now have their heads stuck so tightly in a crack there's no reasoning with them. Old Man Time will have to do his work, but I think within ten years the new museum will have its treasures.

[headscratcher4]

Could somebody tell me if this is true, I seem to recall reading somewhere that Lord Elgin had a ship that sank with a whole lot of booty from the Parthenon on board. So, what constitutes the "Elgin Marbles" is about half the haul, and in their rush to get the prize out of Greece (and from the Turk military who didn't know the value of what they were selling -- or they would have made a better deal) they lost some of the great patrimony of civilization that the British Museum now claims to care for with such pride.

Also, just to add another interesting factoid into the discussion, the son of this very same Lord Elgin is responsible (as he was in command) for one of the great cultural calimities of the 19th Century. Said Elgin the Yonger was in charge of the British Army contingent that sacked the Chinese Summer Palaces (this was, I think, during the Opium War). An amazing artistic storehouse of Chinese culture and art, dating back thousands of years, was destroyed, dispersed and broken up. Same said Elgin took a nice haul for himself -- which I think has also ended up in the British museum to be "preserved" for postarity as the Chinese couldn't possibly manage it.

Moral of the story, if there's an Elgin around, watch your wallet.

[Dancing David]

Does the Washington Monument belong to the Damn Americans?

[CapelDodger]

from Dancing David:
Does the Washington Monument belong to the Damn Americans?
Wasn't there in 1812, so yes.

[kittynh]

The Monument is "new", and quite a bit bigger than an Egyptian needle. I've been up in it. I enjoy Sharon Osbourne who asked what the government did there.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Dancing David
Does the Washington Monument belong to the Damn Americans?

For the moment, yes. But that could change. It also begs the question of why anyone would want it.

[peptoabysmal]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

Have you ever experienced the light of Athens? The very light that Lord Byron has described as the cruelest light of all, the light that reveals all the sins and consoles all the tragedies?

Probably you haven't.

Well, the Marbles can shine for the shake of Humanity only under this absolute light, that's why they have to shine under the sky that gave birth to them.

The Greek Sky :)

That sounds just like the flourescent light in my bathroom. At least as far as revealng all of my sins.

[Jon_in_london]

Originally posted by headscratcher4
Could somebody tell me if this is true, I seem to recall reading somewhere that Lord Elgin had a ship that sank with a whole lot of booty from the Parthenon on board. So, what constitutes the "Elgin Marbles" is about half the haul, and in their rush to get the prize out of Greece (and from the Turk military who didn't know the value of what they were selling -- or they would have made a better deal) they lost some of the great patrimony of civilization that the British Museum now claims to care for with such pride.


I would also like to point out that the marbles that werent taken were later destroyed by the Greeks/Turks. So thank god Elgin, or else the Greeks would have lost all their marbles! ;)

Originally posted by headscratcher4

Also, just to add another interesting factoid into the discussion, the son of this very same Lord Elgin is responsible (as he was in command) for one of the great cultural calimities of the 19th Century. Said Elgin the Yonger was in charge of the British Army contingent that sacked the Chinese Summer Palaces (this was, I think, during the Opium War). An amazing artistic storehouse of Chinese culture and art, dating back thousands of years, was destroyed, dispersed and broken up. Same said Elgin took a nice haul for himself -- which I think has also ended up in the British museum to be "preserved" for postarity as the Chinese couldn't possibly manage it.

You have to see the sacking of the Summer Palace in the right historical context (and I dont think was the Opium Wars). British troops found that their comrades who had been taken prisoner had been tortured to death in rather nasty ways and deemed it neccesary to leave them with a reminder that its not nice to torture prisoners to death just for sh*ts and giggles.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by headscratcher4
Could somebody tell me if this is true, I seem to recall reading somewhere that Lord Elgin had a ship that sank with a whole lot of booty from the Parthenon on board. So, what constitutes the "Elgin Marbles" is about half the haul, and in their rush to get the prize out of Greece (and from the Turk military who didn't know the value of what they were selling -- or they would have made a better deal) they lost some of the great patrimony of civilization that the British Museum now claims to care for with such pride.



What we usually forget is the fact that when The Marbles arrived in England they were the subject of a commercial bargaining between Lord Elgin and the British Government.

The British Parliament condemned Elgin for stealing and destroying Antiquities and after much hesitation over his rightful claims to ownership decided to purchase the Marbles from him and give them to the British Museum.

As for British Museum's proud claims on how they took care of those antiquities, facts talk by themselves:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/543077.stm

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by CapelDodger


That'll be something to see. But it's not cats you have to worry about; Fenris the Wolf is the one that's going to eat the moon at Ragnorak/Armageddon/Gulf War 3. (I can't remember what the Greek version is, or even if there is one.)

Yes of course. I must have been carried away by the fact that cats have played a really nasty role in the latest forum drama...

[headscratcher4]

You have to see the sacking of the Summer Palace in the right historical context (and I dont think was the Opium Wars). British troops found that their comrades who had been taken prisoner had been tortured to death in rather nasty ways and deemed it neccesary to leave them with a reminder that its not nice to torture prisoners to death just for sh*ts and giggles.

Possibly, but in my reading on China, that has never come up, and the Brits were very effective propogandists for their effort to justify empire.

A different question, regarding China, is what were the Brits doing there in the first place...invading and colonizing a country that didn't want them there.

Next, so sacking and robbing a cultural treasure is the way to get back at the "evil" Chinese? Taking the plunder from the sack and selling it on the open market, was that how the torture victems were to be compensated?

My point isn't to take it out of context, indeed the Chinese could have tortured captured Brits. Rather, it is that this was a mob action, not a controlled Army, and that the Elgin family profited greatly from the breakdown of military control...an armed force that was under his command. In either case, it was a crime against humanity...i.e. Lord Elgin saying: They torture our soldiers so go ahead and sack this palace -- is wrong. And, Lord Elgin saying: "Oh dear (note the upper crust brit accent), my lads are mad and sacking that palace yonder, what can I do? Stop, lads, Stop! O' blast them..."

In short, Elgin was responsible, and even in context, sacking that palace for profit doesn't seem like a very effective way to make the chinese pay for an alleged war crime.

Imperialism is ugly. Chinese imperialism is ugly. What the Chinese did to Tibet is horrible. Would you justify the Chinese occupation of Tibet and the distruction of Tibetan culture by parroting the excuses and rationales of the Chinese government?

Anyway, I am not suggesting that the Marbles should be returned (though I think they should). I was merely pointing out a pattern in the imperalist progress -- one that is common to many countries and cultures. Greece has been a victem of Turks and in this case Brits. Greece invaded Turky in the early 20's to try and rebuild the Byzantine empire. All of these cultural accquasitions must be taken in context. But, the point is, now that we know better -- after the fact -- should the status quo remain? That is what I am unsure of.

[Dancing David]

The marbles would have been blown up by the Turks so it is oOkay to take them!

I want to make some really ironic comment that would offend every one...

So ' if an alien space ship was going to crash into the Washington Monument it would be OKAY for japanese tourists to take it apart?

[headscratcher4]

In particular, I love the argument that goes roughly along these lines:

The Turks were destroying the Parthanon, therefore Lord Elgin stepping in, buying the marbles and getting them out of the country helped to save them. The Turks couldn't or wouldn't. And note, that the Turks used the Parhanon as an armory, and an explosion in the 17th Century did severe damage to the Parthanon. In short, Elgin and later the British museum saved the marbles not only from the Turks, but ultimately from the incompetent Greeks who also, because of the backward nature of their emerging nation, their lack of appreciation (and, in modern times, their pollution) could not manage this global treasure.

Given, for a moment, that it is all true. The Turks were terrible custodians of the Greek patrimony. They were ruthless occupiers who destroyed not only Greek Christian culture but also classical culture.

Wow.

I point out that western nations -- including Great Britain -- have not been particularlly good at managing historical patrimony either. Just go to Rome, you'll see how the classical buildings were stripped and laid waste by Italians seeking to decorate their palaces and private museusm...oh, wait, the Italians are as bad about keeping their history as the Greeks.

Let's see. Well, the Spanish basically ransacked the Alhambra and let it go to ruin until the 19th Century...they also pretty well stripped the culture and gold of the new world (probably ok, because the Central and South Americans who created it, couldn't care for it, but than the spanish melted most of it down_ oh, but than the Spanish are really Southern Mediteranian types, so they aren't all that different than Turks, Greeks and Italians.

Germans, well, we know how well they treat the patrimony of other nations, they would have saved all of the culutral treasures of France had they won...probably would have cared for it better than the French too...

Anyway, it goes on and on.

I note that by the logic of the argument for keeping the treasure, we (the US) should gather together all of Iraq's treasures and establish it in a museum (in Texas) for its own preservation. The next despot of Iraq will sell chuncks of it off...just like Saddam. They don't know how to care for it...clearly. Besides, we won it fair and square when we saved the Iragi's from Saddam.

My point is: if it is wrong for the US to take Iraq's cultural heritage by today's standards, why should Great Britain put forth 18th and 19th Century standards as justifications for keeping the marbles?

I have seen and love the marbles. The British Museum display is fabulous. I am really ambivelent about the Brits giving them back...but, the question for me is, ultimately, one of context. The marbles are completely out of context in Britain...they need, in the end, Greece to make them live as on-going artistic achievements, as opposed to nicely carved hunks of stone.


Another possible argument, if the British Museum shouldn't give them back...for all of the reasons argued...paid for, inability to care for, lack of a recognized authority for the sale, etc.

Why should Jews be able to recover art stolen by the Nazi's (through outright theft or forced sales), and than sold one or two times more into the marketplace post WWII. Do we really think that some near dead old jewish man or women is going to "care" for it properly? Won't they just sell it again and keep the cash? Wouldn't the museums do a better job of managing these works of art?

Few people, I think, would argue that the rightful owners shouldn't recover that art, as it was obtained by the Nazi's and subsequent dealers as a reult of theft or coersion. It does't matter whether the original owners or their heirs can manage it or care for it like a museum. It was "stollen" or bought under dubious cicumstances.

Now, this only occured within the last 60 years... If that "loot" is recoverable, why not the Marbles? Should two hundred years make any difference?

[mbp]

Originally posted by headscratcher4

Now, this only occured within the last 60 years... If that "loot" is recoverable, why not the Marbles? Should two hundred years make any difference?
An interesting question. How many years must pass before such a claim becomes void - and can we use the standards of today to judge the actions of the past?

Should Venice give back their loot from the sack of Constantinople in 1204? I personally think that would be going too far.

The Swedes stole huge amounts of irreplaceable Danish cultural property during the wars from 1657-1660. (Here's a partial list (http://www.scania.org/skaniae/1030stor.htm)). Shouldn't they give us that back now that we're all civilised and good friends?
In a way I think they should. These things are distinctly Danish and part of our cultural history. Surely early and unique manuscripts of Danish history belong in Denmark. Just like we returned a large number of manuscripts (http://www.hum.ku.dk/ami/transfer.html) to Iceland even though they weren't loot but originally given as a gift to the University of Copenhagen.
On the other hand most of the stolen items have now spent more time in Sweden than they ever did in Denmark - and that is also part of their history.

I think the Elgin marbles probably should be returned to Greece. But I can also understand why the British Museum - and institutions like it - is afraid of of setting a precedent that could lose them most of their collection. And that would also be a shame, because that museum is a marvelous place in itself.

[Nikk]

Originally posted by headscratcher4

Why should Jews be able to recover art stolen by the Nazi's (through outright theft or forced sales), and than sold one or two times more into the marketplace post WWII. Do we really think that some near dead old jewish man or women is going to "care" for it properly? Won't they just sell it again and keep the cash? Wouldn't the museums do a better job of managing these works of art?

Few people, I think, would argue that the rightful owners shouldn't recover that art, as it was obtained by the Nazi's and subsequent dealers as a reult of theft or coersion. It does't matter whether the original owners or their heirs can manage it or care for it like a museum. It was "stollen" or bought under dubious cicumstances.

Now, this only occured within the last 60 years... If that "loot" is recoverable, why not the Marbles? Should two hundred years make any difference?

I can't agree. I have never been convinced by the argument that property, whether real or personal, taken in war should automatically be returned to the original owners. Once the property has gone on the open market and been bought and sold in good faith the rights of the original owners should be regarded as extinguished. If you believe otherwise perhaps you would care to persuade your government to return all the valuable real estate and profits derived thereof , property of the British Crown, that your ancestors "acquired" at the time of the revolution. I am sure we could find a good use for several zillion dollars. Oh, the Spanish would like a handout too! We could use the money to compensate the descendents of the people we colonised (having made due allowance in our favour for the benefits of introducing them to western culture of course).

As regards the Elgin Marbles I have little doubt that they would have been turned into cement if they had stayed under the control of the Ottomans and there is no legal or moral basis to a claim for their return. Those who argue that they were in any sense stolen only do their cause a disservice.

There is however a powerful cultural and artistic case. Classical Greek culture is so central to Western Civilisation and the Parthenon so iconic that the Elgin Marbles must be regarded as utterly exceptional. Frankly I would regret losing the real thing but, on balance, I would prefer to see an excellent reproduction in the British Museum (easily done) and know that the original frieze is, more or less, back where it belongs.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Nikk

As regards the Elgin Marbles I have little doubt that they would have been turned into cement if they had stayed under the control of the Ottomans and there is no legal or moral basis to a claim for their return. Those who argue that they were in any sense stolen only do their cause a disservice.

Nikk, nothing of sort happened to the Marbles or to the Sculpture that stayed in situ or in other archaeological sites.

Ottomans weren't interested in Ancient Art and they have never done anything to destroy antiquities deliberately.

This argument is not justified by the events. Nothing was turned into cement.Also, The Marbed weren't the only pieces of exceptional artistic values, why Lord Elgin didn't want to "protect" other pieces as well?

Foreign Archaeological expeditions have a long tradition in Greece.

I have worked in the British Archaeological Expedition in Santorini for example and I am proud of it. This opportunity apart from the obvious taugh me to see my country with the eyes of those that have spent years in studying it and taught me to love my country more.

Arthur Evans' work in Crete was exceptional as well. The work of the French in Delfi, of the Germans in Olympia, of the Americans in Agora of Athens, all of them excavations of sites that might be situated in Greece but they belong to the International Community. Olympia doesn't belong to Greece only.

It's wrong to deny that Lord Elgin was nothing but a common thief because by doing so you minimize the contribution of his compatriots in the study of Ancient Greek Art. Lord Elgin was a thief and his compatriots back then knew it very well ( I remind you of the discussion in the Parliament).

Lord Elgin was a controversial personality that has caused nothing but embarassment for the British.

Parthenon as you probably know has been proclaimed a monument that belongs to the Humans Heritage.

Greece like Great Britain is a member of EU so the Marbles won't leave the country :)

We don't demand their return based on the obvious legal argument. The Marbles are achitectural parts -- they are not statues--that can be studied and appreciated only in the architectural context of the Monument. The Parthenon without The Marbles is a crippled building.

Returning them back to the legal owners isn't something easy but we have promised you to substitute them with a great series of exhibits and that is just because we aknowledge the contribution of the British scientists in the study of our past :)

[richardm]

Originally posted by headscratcher4

Next, so sacking and robbing a cultural treasure is the way to get back at the "evil" Chinese? Taking the plunder from the sack and selling it on the open market, was that how the torture victems were to be compensated?

My point isn't to take it out of context, indeed the Chinese could have tortured captured Brits. Rather, it is that this was a mob action, not a controlled Army, and that the Elgin family profited greatly from the breakdown of military control...an armed force that was under his command. In either case, it was a crime against humanity...i.e. Lord Elgin saying: They torture our soldiers so go ahead and sack this palace -- is wrong. And, Lord Elgin saying: "Oh dear (note the upper crust brit accent), my lads are mad and sacking that palace yonder, what can I do? Stop, lads, Stop! O' blast them..."


Actually - no. The destruction of the Summer Palace was a deliberate and calculated act. It was the one way that Elgin could think of that would actually punish the Emperor, without the blow actually falling on the Chinese peasants. A fine would simply be handed down, a demand for the malefactors to be handed over would probably result in the wrong people arriving, and so on.

It was done in a systematic and controlled manner, not by a mob. That's not to say that some of the more portable items weren't liberated, of course...

[Drooper]

The Marbles are surely a case of stolen goods.

The UK is in possesion of stolen goods. It doesn't matter that they paid Elgin for them. It doesn't matter that Elgin paid for them. It doesn't matter that the British Museum took good care of them (well for the most part anyway).

Britain could now take the high ground andreturn the taken artifacts back to Greece. Hopefully for a wonderful display by the time of the olympics. Go Athens!!!!!

[Ed]

Originally posted by Drooper
The Marbles are surely a case of stolen goods.

The UK is in possesion of stolen goods. It doesn't matter that they paid Elgin for them. It doesn't matter that Elgin paid for them. It doesn't matter that the British Museum took good care of them (well for the most part anyway).

Britain could now take the high ground andreturn the taken artifacts back to Greece. Hopefully for a wonderful display by the time of the olympics. Go Athens!!!!!

The precident that this sets for all museums is rather chilling. Any great museum has many objects that have a questionable provenance (you might check out Making the Mummies Dance by Tom Hoving ex director of the Met).

The marbles are the subject of this conversation because they are so well known. I also mentioned the Kalix Krater which has a rather odd past. I would bet money that the Bury St. Edmunds Cross in the cloisters collection was looted too. In the area of my personal interest, Arms and Armor, one cannot look at any national collection without tripping over war booty. The Pembroke Armour, at the Met was made in the Royal Armouries of Greenwich. Did title actually pass to the Pembrokes? One thing is for certain, the UK would never let that treasure out today. So, laws change, situations change. Should it be returned? One might also look at the artifacts from the Dissolution in the UK. I suppose they belong to the RC Church and were swiped by Henry VIII and his creature, Cromwell. Where should they go now?

The Unicorn Tapistries, the Belles Heures, the Hours of Jeanne D'Everaux (Cloisters, again) were possessions of noble/royal French families. The argument could be made that as Royal posessions devolved to the government after the revolution, so should these objects be returned.

The Temple of Dendur (Met) was given to the US for our help in moving the monuments of Abu Simbal during the construction of the Aswan High Dam. I am sure that AUP can find something wrong that the US did there, given financial pressure was this "gift" extorted? Should it be returned?

There is a helmet in the Met and, so the story goes, it might have belonged to Jean D'Arc. It was certainly in Notre Dame at one point. What about that?

The Met was recently presented with a gauntlet from a suit of armor in the Prado. This is clear in unambiguous, the match to the pair is still on display there. It was swiped in the 1800's (as a lot of stuff from there was). Return it? The Prado knows and is just "happy" that it is on display somewhere. AUP would cite undue US influence. Should it be returned?

There is a helmet on display as part of the von Kienbusch Collection in Philadelphia. It was stolen, unquestionably, from a church in Croyden (I think there, could be wrong. This is an interesting story of art theft which I will bore you with one day. Turns out a duplicate was made and swapped in. That one is at the RA now.)

The point that I am making is that 80% of the stuff in US museums of a European origin has a questionalbe provinance . What shall we do? Reduce the great museums of the world to regional collections? As political boundries change and political parties come to power shall we reallocate works of art to reflect new realities?

Forget the stupid marbles. Think of the implications.

[Dancing David]

Very good points Ed!

But you did ask about the marbles, so it is kind of philosophical to then just go foregt the marbles.

This is a very important point however. You have mentioned abunch of items in the more gray area. In that war booty has a cultural meaning for both sides in the conflict, it has mening for the people it is stolen from and for the people who steal it.

As the son of an archaeologist however, there is a real problem with the theft of antiquities and thier sale on the black market, most of the material ends up in the hands of private collectors.

But it is a point of ethics and not a point of reality.
I think ethicaly there is a point at which the Met says, hey this is a great thing, we display it and loan it and it is available to everyone.
But regards the marbles, the greeks feel that they are thier marbles and so they want to be the ones to display and share them.

I ask again, had Dolly Madison not saved the declaration of Independace( I think it was that?) and some Brit had taken it and sold it to some Frenchman, who then sold it to a rich Tzar of Russia, and then it was taken by the Germans during WWII, and they gave it to the Japanese. Wouldn't you want it back?

The destruction of sites and antiquities goes back to having burials. But this is the Richard Nixon argument, it is not okay to be a thief just because everybody else is.

By the way Ed, I know someone who traded some mamaluk armor to the British Museum for some Cromwellian armor.

[Drooper]

Originally posted by Ed


The precident that this sets for all museums is rather chilling. Any great museum has many objects that have a questionable provenance (you might check out Making the Mummies Dance by Tom Hoving ex director of the Met).

Forget the stupid marbles. Think of the implications.

There are no implications if the British museum unilaterally agree to hand over the marbles as a grand gesture.

[headscratcher4]

Ottomans weren't interested in Ancient Art and they have never done anything to destroy antiquities deliberately.

Indeed, the Ottomans, for the most part, left these sites alone. The Acropolis and the Parthanon being notorious exceptions...they used the Parthanon as an Armory. The Greek/Byzantines "repurposed" it as a church...in either case, the building was not being used/respected for its orriginal purpose.

For a variety of reasons...including Ottoman indifference and Western archeological facination with the Greek mainland, archeological sites (with the notable exception of Troy which Schlieman ravaged in his hunt for proof/treasure/fame), the ancient Greek sites in Turkey/Anatolia are in better shape and in site than those in Greece. Ephesus, Priane, Aphrodesia, Miletus, Pergamon, etc. are all great archeological digs and there has been little overt distruction by either Turks or Ottoman, though they've controlled the Anatolian homeland for over 600 years.

Anyway, Ed, you make a number of good points. As I have said all along, I am unsure about the proposition of giving the Marbles back...I note that they, unlike many things in controversy, were not a prize of war. I think the British Museum has done an admirable job in conserving the Marbles , and as noted it is a beautiful exhibit. Further, our more modern sensibilities about plunder really are out of context even to what they may have been 60 years ago. For example, I am not sure that I blame the Russians for trying to hold on the great art taken from the Germans, after all, there is a price to be paid for the millions of lives the Russians lost and the German's did lose a war they started. And, of course, had the German's won, the great art of Russia (that not destroyed as degenerate or Jewish) would be housed today in Hitler's great museum in Linz.

The real question, it seems to me, isn't whether the Greeks should get these back as a matter of course or right. Rather, that the Greeks should get them back or share in the Marbles, because the British Museum is both interested in their preservation and the context of their creation, and because the museum feels a kin-ship with Greek, European and Global efforts to preserve great works of art and culture, and recognizes that (regardless of what has been intimated in the past) that the Greeks are capable of not only preserving the ancient culture of the Helens, but sharing it fully with the world.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Dancing David
Very good points Ed!

But you did ask about the marbles, so it is kind of philosophical to then just go foregt the marbles.

Yes, I know but I wanted to get into the broader issue of ownership. I particularly want to get into private ownership. The whole area is one I find interesting

As the son of an archaeologist however, there is a real problem with the theft of antiquities and thier sale on the black market, most of the material ends up in the hands of private collectors.

Yes. And how do you feel about that?

But it is a point of ethics and not a point of reality.
I think ethicaly there is a point at which the Met says, hey this is a great thing, we display it and loan it and it is available to everyone.
But regards the marbles, the greeks feel that they are thier marbles and so they want to be the ones to display and share them.

I am not sure that national "feelings" really enter into it. I really want the Greeks to be a bunch of happy, Uzo drinking, bottom pinching folks but ultimately I don't really care about how they "feel"

I ask again, had Dolly Madison not saved the declaration of Independace( I think it was that?) and some Brit had taken it and sold it to some Frenchman, who then sold it to a rich Tzar of Russia, and then it was taken by the Germans during WWII, and they gave it to the Japanese. Wouldn't you want it back?

Dunno. Tom Paine is buried in the UK, should I want him back? Did you hear about the copy of the Bill of Rights that turned up recently? Swiped by a Union soldier from a public building in SC(I think) during the CW. In private hands since then. nb. The guy selling it is an antiques dealer in my town. Anyhoo Lincoln issued Executive Order #100 which allowed any property in the rebelling states to be swiped. Whose is it?

The destruction of sites and antiquities goes back to having burials. But this is the Richard Nixon argument, it is not okay to be a thief just because everybody else is.

Thief is flexible when it comes to art.

By the way Ed, I know someone who traded some mamaluk armor to the British Museum for some Cromwellian armor.

Ah, back to something important!!! Yes, my buddies at the Met have gotten into Eastern stuff to the point that one of the curators visited Tibet last year and has taken a course in Tibetian. The problem is that good quality European stuff is sorta non-existant while the Eastern stuff is cheap. For example a mail shirt from Europe might cost $12,000 while one from India hovers around $5,000. The eastern and mid-eastern stuff holds no interest for me, particularly.

I came accross a cache of English CW armor in the attics of the home of Vicecount Boyne a few years ago. He did not really know what it was. Someone else from a landed family gave the RA a ton of stuff that is on exhibition now. IMHO the RA is wise to diversify a bit. They have to do something after that disasterous PC move to stupid Leeds.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Drooper


There are no implications if the British museum unilaterally agree to hand over the marbles as a grand gesture.

Wrong, the implications are enormous. I suspect that you don't truely apprehend the magnitude of the problem. Our buds at the Met came up with an innovative solution regarding Meso-american antiquities some time ago. Basically, Mexico gave them a pass on the stuff (Pardon my use of the word "stuff")that they owned in return for a promise that they would only buy from the government. They also arranged reciprocal exhibitions, If I remember correctly.

Don't brush this off, it is a really big deal.

[kittynh]

well, we have Winnie the Pooh, and I thought we should give him back. But, we ended up keeping him! Seriously, the British should have Winnie the Pooh! But only if they put him in a nice museum, of which there are many in Britian. Hey he's only a bear, but I'm a reader, so to me he's very important.

[Drooper]

Originally posted by Ed


Don't brush this off, it is a really big deal.

I think we are debating the hypothetical here, but I must agree to disagree.

The Museum does not have to recognise any legal claim, just make a gesture, with any required legalese.

For an analogy, say, in a private property dispute between you and me, I decide for the sake of maintaining our cordial relations on this forum I decide to gift (or permanently loan) you the item concerned. Does that create any legal, moral or ethical precedent that will bring down the world around us? I doubt it.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Drooper


I think we are debating the hypothetical here, but I must agree to disagree.

The Museum does not have to recognise any legal claim, just make a gesture, with any required legalese.

For an analogy, say, in a private property dispute between you and me, I decide for the sake of maintaining our cordial relations on this forum I decide to gift (or permanently loan) you the item concerned. Does that create any legal, moral or ethical precedent that will bring down the world around us? I doubt it.


Not to put too fine a point on it the major museums have stolen stuff. We can agree on that. The BM confers with other major museums on this kind of issue. The last thing that they will do is to create any sort of precident. And this is one. Property that another country wants back, regardless of the legal issues. Your analogy falls down because of how widespread this problem is. The BM and the damn Greeks might arrange an entante regarding the marbles, what about Guatamala and the Prado? They say "Hey you damn Dagos, we want our gold back. It's just as important to us as the marbles are to those damn greeks. Put up". That is the precident: that a world class museum returns something for all the world to see. And the Greeks and the Brits can enter into legal agreements till the cows come home, they are not binding on any other museum or country. See my point?

And don't be fooled with that "poor greek fisherman mending nets in the Mediterranian sun" crap. They are a wily race. Next thing you know, one of the bastards will be swiping your Gyro out of your mouth and some damn Greek tycoon will be eating YOUR lunch on his damn 1000 foot yacht.

But you, you snivilling appeaser, you'd say "Ari, enjoy! The Gyro is part of your patrimony that can only be properly enjoyed amidst earthquakes in your Greek sun by Greeks. Want my coke too?"

I know you and your kind all too well. It will be the marble headstones that mark our fallen heros going to Athens if you have your way.

You and your kind sicken me.

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


Nikk, nothing of sort happened to the Marbles or to the Sculpture that stayed in situ or in other archaeological sites.

Ottomans weren't interested in Ancient Art and they have never done anything to destroy antiquities deliberately.

This argument is not justified by the events. Nothing was turned into cement.Also, The Marbed weren't the only pieces of exceptional artistic values, why Lord Elgin didn't want to "protect" other pieces as well?

Foreign Archaeological expeditions have a long tradition in Greece.

I have worked in the British Archaeological Expedition in Santorini for example and I am proud of it. This opportunity apart from the obvious taugh me to see my country with the eyes of those that have spent years in studying it and taught me to love my country more.

Arthur Evans' work in Crete was exceptional as well. The work of the French in Delfi, of the Germans in Olympia, of the Americans in Agora of Athens, all of them excavations of sites that might be situated in Greece but they belong to the International Community. Olympia doesn't belong to Greece only.

It's wrong to deny that Lord Elgin was nothing but a common thief because by doing so you minimize the contribution of his compatriots in the study of Ancient Greek Art. Lord Elgin was a thief and his compatriots back then knew it very well ( I remind you of the discussion in the Parliament).

Lord Elgin was a controversial personality that has caused nothing but embarassment for the British.

Parthenon as you probably know has been proclaimed a monument that belongs to the Humans Heritage.

Greece like Great Britain is a member of EU so the Marbles won't leave the country :)

We don't demand their return based on the obvious legal argument. The Marbles are achitectural parts -- they are not statues--that can be studied and appreciated only in the architectural context of the Monument. The Parthenon without The Marbles is a crippled building.

Returning them back to the legal owners isn't something easy but we have promised you to substitute them with a great series of exhibits and that is just because we aknowledge the contribution of the British scientists in the study of our past :)

Well we reach the same conclusion by very different routes. In my last paragraph I said.........

"There is however a powerful cultural and artistic case. Classical Greek culture is so central to Western Civilisation and the Parthenon so iconic that the Elgin Marbles must be regarded as utterly exceptional. Frankly I would regret losing the real thing but, on balance, I would prefer to see an excellent reproduction in the British Museum (easily done) and know that the original frieze is, more or less, back where it belongs"...................

In other words what I am saying is that I would like to see the marbles back in Athens. Oh but haven't the foundations for the new museum been tearing up an irreplaceable pre classical site? Bit of an own goal there.

But to return to Lord Elgin. The Ottomans may not have destroyed pre muslim antiquities for religous reasons but they most certainly destroyed them to reuse the stone for building works, cannon balls and I understood in cement making. In no sense could they be regarded as reliable custodians of classical art works. At the time Lord Elgin was ambassador rich west europeans had long been visiting the classical world buying artefacts and sending them back home. Thus another possible threat to the marbles was that they would be sold off bit by bit and dispersed throughout Europe ( and ultimately the US ). As it is the vast bulk of the artwork is in one place.

Let's now look at the legal argument in a bit more detail. Elgin was an ambassador to the Ottoman empire, there was no Greece and it was far from obvious that there ever would be such a state. After all there never had been such a state before. He brought in experts to make moulds and measurements of classical artworks and obtained an administrative authorisation a "Firman" to remove carved and inscribed stones. It was on the basis of this authorisation that he removed the stones. No doubt he had to bribe local officials as well. In fact he did not buy the stones from anybody. He removed something the Ottomans regarded as worthless with the permission of Ottoman officials. That is to say he acted with the knowledge and permission of the de facto and de jure governors of the province. How anyone can argue that this constitutes theft baffles me.

To be disingenuous for a moment. If you argue that the Elgin marbles should be returned because they were stolen then in effect you create a threat to the interests of major museums throughout the western world. The term "stolen" can be interpreted in many different ways. As Ed has pointed out there is a lot of stuff around with a very dubious provenance. If you accept my argument that the marbles are iconic and exceptional you can perhaps bypass that problem.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Nikk


If you accept my argument that the marbles are iconic and exceptional you can perhaps bypass that problem.

Ahhhhhhhh.... You leave the door open to charges of being insensitive to other cultures, very un-PC. Perhaps my west african stick shaped god is just as iconic.

What has happened in some other cases is that museums share the pieces, say 5 years at a time. These marbles are a tad big and delicate for that though.

If I were the BM I would hang tough no matter what position the Greeks take. If the argument was that they are "Iconic" I would use that as a further rationale for keeping them.

The Great Museums cannot, nor should they, fold on this.

[Nikk]

Originally posted by headscratcher4


Indeed, the Ottomans, for the most part, left these sites alone. The Acropolis and the Parthanon being notorious exceptions...they used the Parthanon as an Armory. The Greek/Byzantines "repurposed" it as a church...in either case, the building was not being used/respected for its orriginal purpose.

For a variety of reasons...including Ottoman indifference and Western archeological facination with the Greek mainland, archeological sites (with the notable exception of Troy which Schlieman ravaged in his hunt for proof/treasure/fame), the ancient Greek sites in Turkey/Anatolia are in better shape and in site than those in Greece. Ephesus, Priane, Aphrodesia, Miletus, Pergamon, etc. are all great archeological digs and there has been little overt distruction by either Turks or Ottoman, though they've controlled the Anatolian homeland for over 600 years.


Well that's only because the sites in modern day Turkey (Anatolia) were both numerous and rather inaccessible. When the site was accessible they most definitely did not leave it alone. Take for example Alexandria Troas which once covered a thousand acres and was only a short sea journey from Constantinople. Much of the marble and decent stone was used for building work in the capital. A cannon ball factory was set up in the 18th century which used stone and marble columns for the larger bores and stone sarcophagi for the smaller. The industry was still going in the 1830's. There isn't too much of the raw material left now!

It's entirely understandable that Elgin did not want to leave irreplaceable sculpture under Ottoman control.

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Ed


Ahhhhhhhh.... You leave the door open to charges of being insensitive to other cultures, very un-PC. Perhaps my west african stick shaped god is just as iconic.

What has happened in some other cases is that museums share the pieces, say 5 years at a time. These marbles are a tad big and delicate for that though.

If I were the BM I would hang tough no matter what position the Greeks take. If the argument was that they are "Iconic" I would use that as a further rationale for keeping them.

The Great Museums cannot, nor should they, fold on this.

Your argument that it would create a bad precedent is of course a powerful one. In addition there is the argument (used by the BM ) that a great museum can offer a "universal" perspective on human culture and thus it makes sense to keep the marbles in the BM where they can be seen in the context offered by other significant european/middle eastern/asian artefacts.

For me the fact that the Periclean structures on the Acropolis still stand (after a fashion) buttresses the argument that the case of the Elgin marbles is quite unique and does not constitute a precedent. We are after all not talking about a portable artefact but an integral part of an extant structure.

And now as its 2.40am here I shall leave the marbles in peace!

[Drooper]

Originally posted by Ed


And don't be fooled with that "poor greek fisherman mending nets in the Mediterranian sun" crap. They are a wily race. Next thing you know, one of the bastards will be swiping your Gyro out of your mouth and some damn Greek tycoon will be eating YOUR lunch on his damn 1000 foot yacht.

But you, you snivilling appeaser, you'd say "Ari, enjoy! The Gyro is part of your patrimony that can only be properly enjoyed amidst earthquakes in your Greek sun by Greeks. Want my coke too?"

I know you and your kind all too well. It will be the marble headstones that mark our fallen heros going to Athens if you have your way.

You and your kind sicken me.

What the f...???


Your assertion has not be proven. Clearly your judgement is too clouded by emotion.


BTW, congratulations. I nearly managed 1000 posts without ever putting anybody on my ignore list. You were just too clever for me.

wanking deity

[Giz]

The link between modern and classical Greece seems a bit tenuous anyway. A bit like modern and pharonic Egypt, different customs, religions, ancestry.

It's hardly as if modern Greece is a hotbed of classical knowledge. There are probably more ancient greek speakers in the BM than there are in Athens!

If the Parthenon Marbles are truly part of humanities common heritage then let them be displayed in the BM where they can be viewed in the widest, richest context, the other treasures of the worlds cultures, in the center of the world - London!

[Ed]

Originally posted by Giz
The link between modern and classical Greece seems a bit tenuous anyway. A bit like modern and pharonic Egypt, different customs, religions, ancestry.

It's hardly as if modern Greece is a hotbed of classical knowledge. There are probably more ancient greek speakers in the BM than there are in Athens!

If the Parthenon Marbles are truly part of humanities common heritage then let them be displayed in the BM where they can be viewed in the widest, richest context, the other treasures of the worlds cultures, in the center of the world - London!

Precidents aside, I agree with this view. It appears that we have gotten a bit sensitive when it comes to asserting primacy in various areas. Certainly London is more of a cultural centroid than Athens. Now, who are the wankers that moved the Royal Armouries to stupid Leeds?

[Dancing David]

Ed,

I feel personaly that the main issue is to get the stuff that is in the ground to stay in the ground so that it can be studied in the future. But given the cash factor that isn't going to happen. As archaeology advances we learn more each time something is dug up in the future, so the longer it stays undisturbed the better. But hey, reality is a very different beast.

I am not sure what to do with all the antiquities that have been dug up already. I know that I would return it to the country of origin if I inherited ut, but having been to Mexico I would make sure that it was put in a meuseum run by locals, so they could profit from selling it , and not some government fat cat!

My friend's brother said that this mamaluk armor was very rare, like only the third piece in existance, the curator doubted him when he first called, but hey he did trade with him in the end.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Nikk


In other words what I am saying is that I would like to see the marbles back in Athens. Oh but haven't the foundations for the new museum been tearing up an irreplaceable pre classical site? Bit of an own goal there.

You can't dig a hole in Athens deeper than 12m without finding relics of the Classical City. The Archaeological Layer starts at this depth and it goes down for 20 more meters... :)

That's way the Athenean sub-way cost that much and it was digged deep in the soil. The constructors wanted to avoid the Archaeological layer.

But to return to Lord Elgin. The Ottomans may not have destroyed pre muslim antiquities for religous reasons but they most certainly destroyed them to reuse the stone for building works, cannon balls and I understood in cement making. In no sense could they be regarded as reliable custodians of classical art works.

No they weren't indeed but it's too much to suggest that Lord Elgin saved the Marbles.


At the time Lord Elgin was ambassador rich west europeans had long been visiting the classical world buying artefacts and sending them back home[.quote]

This was a practice since the Roman Era :)

[quote]ow look at the legal argument in a bit more detail. Elgin was an ambassador to the Ottoman empire, there was no Greece and it was far from obvious that there ever would be such a state. After all there never had been such a state before. He brought in experts to make moulds and measurements of classical artworks and obtained an administrative authorisation a "Firman" to remove carved and inscribed stones. It was on the basis of this authorisation that he removed the stones. No doubt he had to bribe local officials as well. In fact he did not buy the stones from anybody. He removed something the Ottomans regarded as worthless with the permission of Ottoman officials. That is to say he acted with the knowledge and permission of the de facto and de jure governors of the province. How anyone can argue that this constitutes theft baffles me.

Elgin was an ambassador in Instabul and he knew that Parthenon wasn't just any monument. He tricked the Ottomans and he stole the Marbles from people that couldn't defend them.


isingenuous for a moment. If you argue that the Elgin marbles should be returned because they were stolen then in effect you create a threat to the interests of major museums throughout the western world. The term "stolen" can be interpreted in many different ways. As Ed has pointed out there is a lot of stuff around with a very dubious provenance. If you accept my argument that the marbles are iconic and exceptional you can perhaps bypass that problem.

It's your argument that the Greek Government uses and not the legal one exactly for the reasons you explained.

I am against that of course but I didn't expect any better from a socialist government. The end does not justify the means.

The justification of the Greek Government constitutes a kind of Historical Revisionism.

The return of the Marbles to Greece must open the way for the return of other artifacts to other countries as Egypt for example.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Giz The link between modern and classical Greece seems a bit tenuous anyway. A bit like modern and pharonic Egypt, different customs, religions, ancestry.

It's hardly as if modern Greece is a hotbed of classical knowledge. There are probably more ancient greek speakers in the BM than there are in Athens!

If the Parthenon Marbles are truly part of humanities common heritage then let them be displayed in the BM where they can be viewed in the widest, richest context, the other treasures of the worlds cultures, in the center of the world - London!

First of all, if the Marbles are be exposed in the centre of the world they must be transfered to New York City.

Americans are over the 19th ce fashion of exposing exhibits. It seems that the English need to visit Metropolitan to see what Exhibition of Ancient Art means.

Also, it seems that you know very little about the Greek language and about Pharaonic Egypt... In the latter they didn't speak Arabic.

The 70% of the words of the ancient Greek language( I presume that you have in mind the idiom of Plato and not the one of Homer or the one of Sapho, or the one of the Alexandrians, or the one of Saint John the Evangelist-- all these are Greek...) have survived in their identical form in the moderm Greek language.

I think that we are a unique case of a group of people in History that talk the same language for more than 2500 years...

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra




The return of the Marbles to Greece must open the way for the return of other artifacts to other countries as Egypt for example.

I have read (Hoving, again) that the Egyptian stewardship of the Tut artifacts is a crime. Having stuff is one thing, taking care of it is another.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Ed


I have read (Hoving, again) that the Egyptian stewardship of the Tut artifacts is a crime. Having stuff is one thing, taking care of it is another.

I have never heard of that but I don't doubt it. I mean if you check the link from BBC I provided in a previous post and see what the British that boast about their knowledge in restoration did to the Marbles who can blame poor Egyptians?

[Small Town Jesus]

The British Museum couldn't just hand the Elgin Marbles over to Greece even if it wanted to. It would require an act of parliament to change the law.

Interestingly, there was an item on the news last night about Australian Aboriginals demanding back the several hundred skulls and other bones that are in museums and institutes around the UK. A museum in Manchester had returned the bones that they owned (the law only seems to apply to national museums such as the British Museum and the Natural History Museum) but a new Cambridge institute that studies the development of ancient man seemed pretty keen to hang on to theirs.

The British Museum and the Natural History Museum seem terrified of setting a precedent so I can't imagine them petitioning for a change in the law anytime soon. Apparently, what is on display in the BM is only a small percentage of all the booty they have stashed in storerooms so maybe the whole idea of returning objects is anathema to a curators hoarding instinct.

Personally, I am in favor of returning the marbles though I suspect that there is a real danger that they may by now have become thoroughly Anglicized and after a short time in the Greek sunshine they will be out getting drunk, having sex in public and mooning passers-by. :D

STJ

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


You can't dig a hole in Athens deeper than 12m without finding relics of the Classical City. The Archaeological Layer starts at this depth and it goes down for 20 more meters... :)

I'm sure that's true; BUT you can take the time to excavate what you find in a professional fashion before you destroy it. To slice through it while saying hey, we'd like these priceless items back and we're going to really, really look after them, honest, - while destroying irreplaceble stuff is very poor PR.

No they weren't indeed but it's too much to suggest that Lord Elgin saved the Marbles.

Elgin was an ambassador in Instabul and he knew that Parthenon wasn't just any monument. He tricked the Ottomans and he stole the Marbles from people that couldn't defend them.



Elgin was faced with the following situation. The Ottomans couldn't care less about the marbles. Private collectors would pay good money for sections of them. The French would love to get their hands on them and were avid collectors, as Napoleon's expedition to Egypt showed! There was no Greek administration to take a view one way or the other. For all Elgin knew there might still be a Turkish presence in Europe for the next two centuries. As indeed there is. Do you honestly believe the Ottoman officials would have hesitated to sell the marbles as soon as they realised serious money was involved? If he hadn't acted it is highly probable that the frieze would be sold off by sections, or even destroyed if there was a pressing need for building materials. I believe the Parthenon was fortified during the war of independence and shelled, damaging one of the temples.

If you use emotive words like stole then you should have some legal definition of theft in mind. In this case Elgin had a legal authorisation and the authorities took no steps to hinder him in his lengthy operations.

It is impossible to argue that he stole them from Greece as the country didn't exist. If they were the property of the Ottoman empire and were stolen then I assume they should be returned to the successor state of the empire i.e. Turkey.

It's your argument that the Greek Government uses and not the legal one exactly for the reasons you explained.


But I really don't think there is a valid legal argument and if there was it might cause the marbles to be returned to Turkey.


I am against that of course but I didn't expect any better from a socialist government. The end does not justify the means.


As you can see I disagree, the only valid "argument" is an emotional and sentimental one.

The justification of the Greek Government constitutes a kind of Historical Revisionism.

I would say it was an honest justification.

The return of the Marbles to Greece must open the way for the return of other artifacts to other countries as Egypt for example.

Should it? There is a cultural continuity of a sort between classical and modern Greece. There is no such continuity between Pharaonic and modern arabic Egypt.

Besides I am morally opposed to handing artistic treasures over to people who have not mastered the intricacies of the flush toilet.

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


First of all, if the Marbles are be exposed in the centre of the world they must be transfered to New York City.

Americans are over the 19th ce fashion of exposing exhibits. It seems that the English need to visit Metropolitan to see what Exhibition of Ancient Art means.


Come now my dear!

In London the marbles are within easy reach of several hundred million civilized people. In the U.S. outside of a few major urban centres the majority speak in grunts and believe the world began in 4004b.c. They would probably think they were pagan relics and throw burgers at them! Needless to say the habitueés of this forum are excepted from these remarks.

Besides you can squeeze more svelte Europeans into a gallery to view the exhibits than North Americans.

[NoZed Avenger]

Originally posted by Ed
If I were the BM I would hang tough no matter what position the Greeks take.


Ok. Maybe I have just read through too many medical records recently, but could we PLEASE stop refering to it as "the BM"?

Thanks in advance for your coopoeration.

N/A

[kittynh]

You are reading old Thomas Hoving. I've studied with Mr.Hoving, and had the interesting experience of flying with him (thoughts of JFKjr. floating through my head...). The Egyptians have updated their Tut exhibit. They have also invested much in their history recently. Tourism and cable tv (all those lovely Egyptology shows) have been a big help. Mr. Hoving also has a bone to pick with Italy, since they have laws about keeping artifacts in the country. In Italy, you can't pull a weed without finding something! Most of it justs sits in warehouses, because they can't put it all on display! So, most museums would LOVE some of that stuff. Mr. Hoving was famous, and infamous, for finding ways to get his beloved MET some special artifact he wanted.

I always say Mr.Hoving is one of the best skeptics around. That's because he is an expert (and wrote a funny book) at finding fakes! I learned from him what to look for when I go to a museum, because there is no museum where everything is what it is supposed to be. the Victoria and Albert has a great exhibit on fakes they had in their collection. The fun part is finding the ones still on display.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Nikk
Besides I am morally opposed to handing artistic treasures over to people who have not mastered the intricacies of the flush toilet.



I would suggest that that is more of an aesthetic judgement.

[Ed]

Originally posted by kittynh
You are reading old Thomas Hoving. I've studied with Mr.Hoving, and had the interesting experience of flying with him (thoughts of JFKjr. floating through my head...). The Egyptians have updated their Tut exhibit. They have also invested much in their history recently. Tourism and cable tv (all those lovely Egyptology shows) have been a big help. Mr. Hoving also has a bone to pick with Italy, since they have laws about keeping artifacts in the country. In Italy, you can't pull a weed without finding something! Most of it justs sits in warehouses, because they can't put it all on display! So, most museums would LOVE some of that stuff. Mr. Hoving was famous, and infamous, for finding ways to get his beloved MET some special artifact he wanted.



What was the place of study. I'd like to chat with him.

I am rereading his book on fakes now.

[Cleopatra]

To Nikk :

I'm sure that's true; BUT you can take the time to excavate what you find in a professional fashion before you destroy it. To slice through it while saying hey, we'd like these priceless items back and we're going to really, really look after them, honest, - while destroying irreplaceble stuff is very poor PR.

Errrr. This is exactly what we are doing and this explains the reason of the delay. They have excavated the area and they won't destroy anything, we never destroy anything! Go check the basements of the buildings of Athens!! You will be surprised!

Do you honestly believe the Ottoman officials would have hesitated to sell the marbles as soon as they realised serious money was involved? If he hadn't acted it is highly probable that the frieze would be sold off by sections, or even destroyed if there was a pressing need for building materials. I believe the Parthenon was fortified during the war of independence and shelled, damaging one of the temples.

Nikk it's not right to make assumptions for the Past. The Ottomans haven't sold anything from other sites I can't really pressume that they would sell the antiquities of Acropolis. You know, Ottomans weren't the only conquerors Greece met but what Lord Elgin did is unique in our History.

mpossible to argue that he stole them from Greece as the country didn't exist. If they were the property of the Ottoman empire and were stolen then I assume they should be returned to the successor state of the empire i.e. Turkey.

Parthenon is in Greece. The Antiquities of Pergamon are Greek this doesn’t mean that they have to be returned to Greece since Pergamon is in Turkey…

But I really don't think there is a valid legal argument and if there was it might cause the marbles to be returned to Turkey.

English humor... I love it.


Should it? There is a cultural continuity of a sort between classical and modern Greece. There is no such continuity between Pharaonic and modern arabic Egypt.

Besides I am morally opposed to handing artistic treasures over to people who have not mastered the intricacies of the flush toilet.

If I said anything similar in a discussion about Middle East you would be the first to jump on my neck... ;)

But since you appreciate good humor allow me to add that I prefer the Egyptians than the drunken offsprings of the British that as Cicero pointed out they were so stupid that it wasn't advisable to have them even as slaves!!!

You know of what I am talking about, the British you see in Faliraki and in Corfu and they make you feel ashamed that you were born human...

But of course I am joking :)

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
To Nikk :

Nikk it's not right to make assumptions for the Past. The Ottomans haven't sold anything from other sites I can't really pressume that they would sell the antiquities of Acropolis. You know, Ottomans weren't the only conquerors Greece met but what Lord Elgin did is unique in our History.



[massive coughing fit] Rome [/massive coughing fit]

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Ed


[massive coughing fit] Rome [/massive coughing fit]

Yes of course you are right I was just having in mind the Modern Era.

I have an American friend who is a professor of Archaeology and he visits Greece every year. He loves to tease me by making observations regarding the way Greeks treat Roman Antiquities.

We have been walking together in the Archaeological site of Corinth where guards were very protective to the Greek Antiquites. They became crazy if they saw anybody walking on pieces of marbles but they didn't seem to care about some kids that they were dancing on a Roman Temple :p

Regarding what Nikk says about Americans and Antiquities : I have escorted this friend of mine and his students to the Athenian Agora once and as long as he was talking passionately about the Classical Antiquity , the American students were talking photos of a decadent Roman statue...

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


Yes of course you are right I was just having in mind the Modern Era.



[paroxisim of coughing] Moving goal posts [/paroxism of coughing]

:D

[Ed]

There was a comparison between the one Caryatid that is in the BritMus (always sensitive) and those that remain in Greece. I can't find the pictures. We might all try and find them since this belies the claim that the Elgin's would not have been destroyed if they remained in Greece.

Regarding Greek culture:

Cleopatra, could you comment on the story that I read in my latest copy of "Gay Boys in Bondage". They claimed that Plato got his name from the fact that he had to slip a plate in the back of his toga so that he would not be bothered by naughty young men while he was propounding his philosophy. Any truth to this?

[Giz]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


Also, it seems that you know very little about the Greek language and about Pharaonic Egypt... In the latter they didn't speak Arabic.

The 70% of the words of the ancient Greek language( I presume that you have in mind the idiom of Plato and not the one of Homer or the one of Sapho, or the one of the Alexandrians, or the one of Saint John the Evangelist-- all these are Greek...) have survived in their identical form in the moderm Greek language.

I think that we are a unique case of a group of people in History that talk the same language for more than 2500 years...

I was under the impression (fostered by the BBC) that a familiarity with modern Greek did little to enable comprehension of the Ancients - rather like assuming that a modern Brit would understand Chaucer.

I admit thats not quite as much of a difference as Pharonic/Arabic Egypt but I was constructing, if your greekness will pardon the expression, a polemic.

I just think that the holders of the Marbles could be considered on the folowing points:

1) Aquired legally from the relevant authorities - 1 up to the BM
2) The descendants of the creators should have possession - How much of the current Greek demos have roots in later barbarian incursions - 0 for each side.
3) Cultural heritage - we are all children of the greco-roman world (at least in the west). However the torch of progress and fire of liberty has been passed. Perhaps newer standard bearers should hold the artifacts? - 1 to the BM
4) Access - How many people will see them? - 1 to the BM
5) Context - Can these elements of our common human heritage be seen in the light of other human cultures and acheivements? - 1 to the BM.

The Greek argument would appear to be more chauvinistic but based on the dispassionate assessment above I would say it has no merit.

And who knows, if they stay in London I may even get round to seeing them on day!

[kittynh]

WHen Kitten was attending high school in Jordan she would laugh how people would just go pick up some Roman ruins and make a bird bath, or decorate their garden. It was stuff the Romans left, and there was just so much of it...

[Nikk]

Originally posted by NoZed Avenger



Ok. Maybe I have just read through too many medical records recently, but could we PLEASE stop refering to it as "the BM"?

Thanks in advance for your coopoeration.

N/A

??????? So what does "the BM" mean to you.........oh I see what you mean!

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
[b]To Nikk :



Errrr. This is exactly what we are doing and this explains the reason of the delay. They have excavated the area and they won't destroy anything, we never destroy anything! Go check the basements of the buildings of Athens!! You will be surprised!

........I raised the point because it IS bad PR and assists the opposition. There has been a lot of Greek opposition to the excavations and the location and scale of the museum. I am not going to give links because they are off topic.

Nikk it's not right to make assumptions for the Past. The Ottomans haven't sold anything from other sites I can't really pressume that they would sell the antiquities of Acropolis. You know, Ottomans weren't the only conquerors Greece met but what Lord Elgin did is unique in our History.

.......But the Ottomans did use classical antiquities for building material, "pagan" images were vandalised and there was a healthy trade in classical sculpture all of which could have led to the destruction or dispersion of the frieze. The Parthenon itself was incompetently restored by Balanos. In the 1890s the Greek Archaeological Service removed irreplaceable historical structures from the Acropolis to leave only the classical structures.

I do realise that Elgin acted in a high handed way, had mixed motives and that he exploited his rank and the fact that Britain had lifted the threat of a French invasion in order to obtain access to the monument. Still I think that overall his actions were beneficial. We will never know what would have happened to the frieze if it had remained in situ.

Parthenon is in Greece. The Antiquities of Pergamon are Greek this doesn’t mean that they have to be returned to Greece since Pergamon is in Turkey…



English humor... I love it.

........I was being semi serious. If there was an international convention on the subject you might find artefacts being returned to the successor state of the last legal owner. You can see that the whole issue can raise huge problems.


If I said anything similar in a discussion about Middle East you would be the first to jump on my neck... ;)

No I don't think so. A_U_P would probably get there first.

But since you appreciate good humor allow me to add that I prefer the Egyptians than the drunken offsprings of the British that as Cicero pointed out they were so stupid that it wasn't advisable to have them even as slaves!!!

And didn't pope Gregory describe them as "Non Angli sed Angeli" ?

You know of what I am talking about, the British you see in Faliraki and in Corfu and they make you feel ashamed that you were born human...

But of course I am joking :)

I regard that as fair criticism. When we are good, we are very, very good and when we are bad we are horrid! Binge drinking has been a feature of the British for about 500 years. I really don't know why.

[Cleopatra]

posted by Nikk:

........I raised the point because it IS bad PR and assists the opposition. There has been a lot of Greek opposition to the excavations and the location and scale of the museum. I am not going to give links because they are off topic.


There is no need for links :) The problem of antiquities in Greece is a social problem too. People can build nothing without consulting an Archaeologist first and you have to wait for years until an archaeologist finds some time to make an autopsy in your land before allowing you to build. There is always the question if the past can dictate our future and to which length.

.......But the Ottomans did use classical antiquities for building material, "pagan" images were vandalised and there was a healthy trade in classical sculpture all of which could have led to the destruction or dispersion of the frieze. The Parthenon itself was incompetently restored by Balanos. In the 1890s the Greek Archaeological Service removed irreplaceable historical structures from the Acropolis to leave only the classical structures.


The Balanos restoration was indeed one of the most unfortunate moments for the monument but this is what we knew about restoration back then.

Under the current restoration program the collumns that Balanos has restored have been dismantled and they have replaced the iron that Balanos has used and it has been oxidised and has destroyed the marble with titanium.

The restoration is a separate issue of great scientific interest. Five years ago we have organised a Colloquium and we have invited experts from all ever the world to discuss until which point the Temple should be restorated because some of the damages that the building has suffered belonged to its History. The bombardment of Morosini is one of the examples.

That's an ineresting topic to discuss;is it right to restore completely ancient buildings?

........I was being semi serious. If there was an international convention on the subject you might find artefacts being returned to the successor state of the last legal owner. You can see that the whole issue can raise huge problems.

I don't think that we would ever have to face this problem if we specified what constitutes Cultural Heritage.

I regard that as fair criticism. When we are good, we are very, very good and when we are bad we are horrid! Binge drinking has been a feature of the British for about 500 years. I really don't know why.

The majority of Greeks when they relate British people to Greece it's not the the image of a youngster in summer holidays that have in mind.

For us British areLord Byron, Lawrence Durrel, Patrick Leigh Fermor, John Fowles, Oliver Taplin, Colin Renfrew plus the countless British Archaeologists that with their writings taugh us to love our country more :)

[Cleopatra]

The British League:

May anybody from our members in Britain post a short account about the (in)famous female Indiana Jones, the British archaeologist Dorothy King(sp?) because I listen to many controversial things here?

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
The British League:

May anybody from our members in Britain post a short account about the (in)famous female Indiana Jones, the British archaeologist Dorothy King(sp?) because I listen to many controversial things here?

Certainly. Here is an article from last weeks Observer (http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/artsandhumanities/story/0,12241,1086929,00.html) on the pulchritudinous doctor.

Her view on the marbles is that ......... " But King said: 'The marbles are part of world culture and have as much to do with twenty-first century Britain as twenty-first century Greece. The British Museum cares for them, whereas anyone can see the Greeks haven't taken care of their cultural heritage. You wouldn't leave your children in the care of someone you didn't trust.' "

Her views are bound to be a success on TV because she is:-

a) Blonde
b) Pretty
c) Blonde ( see (a) above )

Google for "Dr Dorothy King" for more.

[Cleopatra]

Thanks Nikk

I have read the article I was interested in impressions mostly. What do you think about her.

Will the readers of "Sun" have an opinion on the Elgin Marbles now? :p

[Nikk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Thanks Nikk

I have read the article I was interested in impressions mostly. What do you think about her.

Will the readers of "Sun" have an opinion on the Elgin Marbles now? :p

Joking apart, she seems to be just one more of the superficially lightweight popularisers the TV companies use to pull in an audience for "serious" programmes. I assume she must be technically competent or she wouldn't have got her doctorate. So far she has not got a high media profile, as far as I know, and it would be untrue to say that I have any particular impression of her other than the above. As her book on the marbles will cost £37 it is clearly not aimed at the popular market.

I don't think that the readers of the "Sun" are likely to have a view on the subject unless the editor decides to run a campaign about the marbles. If I was a tabloid journalist I could see more more readers being entertained by a knock the foreigners, keep the marbles here approach than by adopting any other line.

For the marbles to be returned there would have to be either large scale public support for the idea or widespread establishment support and neither exists. It's probably most accurate to say that there is a modest amount of support for return amongst the chattering classes and strong opposition amongst those who would actually take the decision. Perhaps if you were to introduce english style foxhunting into Greece and say that you wouldn't stop until you got the marbles back you might get some support from the labour party. Blackmail often works when moral appeals fail!

[Jon_in_london]

Well, I went to see the marbles last weekend. They arent very impressive really. All broken and old and dirty. I think they should just be turfed out to make space for something more worthwhile.

If the Greeks want them, they can fish them out the skip! :p

[Ed]

Originally posted by Jon_in_london
Well, I went to see the marbles last weekend. They arent very impressive really. All broken and old and dirty. I think they should just be turfed out to make space for something more worthwhile.

If the Greeks want them, they can fish them out the skip! :p

Hell, Jon. If you are going to give them to the Greeks you might as well give them to me.

I'll set them up in the back someplace and you can come and see them whenever you want.

Advantages to giving them to me:

-They will be the only Greek antiquities in the collection.
-Come see them whenever you want
-No facile and garish lightshows ... I will loan you a flashlight if you come at night
-ENGLISH SPOKEN HERE
-No skirt wearing
-No silly headgear
-No moaning over "lost patramonies"
-Reasonable enterance fee (="FREE")
-No swarthy terrorists hanging out in our airport ... errr um .. strike that
-Local airport is New YORK, makes you feel right at home!!!:D
-No destroyed monuments to our accomplishments that we moan over ..errrr..... either don't look south or strike that.
-I will appreciate them and power wash them regularly
-I will not snarl that they were mine all along and that you are lucky you gave them back in time
-I will let you knock off a tiny piece as a memento of your trip for $5.00
-Only Greeks around are seamen swimming ashore in NY harbor

So, you see, I am the obvious choice

[Ed]

No nays so I guess I get them. I'll be over to pick them up this coming thursday :D

[Cleopatra]

I am campaigning for you. Read my signature!

[richardm]

Try to make it Thursday afternoon. We've just given them a once-over with Brilliant White gloss paint so they look nice and clean for you*.

But I think they're going to need another coat. So unless you want paint marks on your luggage I'd leave it as late as possible to give it time to dry properly.



*As ever, the most difficult bit was getting the surface prepared for the paint. Some of those marbles have really fiddly areas, and it's a bugger to get the sandpaper into them. Lucky the chief curator from the Egyptian collection turned up with the whirly disk on the end of a cordless drill he uses to clear the splinters off the sarcophaguses, or we'd still be there now.

[Cleopatra]

Errrrr

Seriously. Did you, people know that the Marbles as everything else on the entablature of the Parthenon was painted with vivid colors? :)

[richardm]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Errrrr

Seriously. Did you, people know that the Marbles as everything else on the entablature of the Parthenon was painted with vivid colors? :)

Actually, no, I didn't know that. I assumed that they made them out of marble because it is intrinsically attractive.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
I am campaigning for you. Read my signature!

They will, naturally, be known henceforth as the

EDGIN Marbles

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by richardm

Actually, no, I didn't know that. I assumed that they made them out of marble because it is intrinsically attractive.

Bold face mine: This is bibliographically known as : The white marbles syndrome :)

All the Ancient Greek statues were painted in bright unnatural colors. Hair were painted blue or red and the face was enhanced with "unnatural" colors.

Why is that? Because the Greeks wanted to show that the perfection those statues depicted belonged to a different world that had nothing in common with the world of the humans :)

Ed: Language award nomination :D

[Ed]

Originally posted by richardm
Try to make it Thursday afternoon. We've just given them a once-over with Brilliant White gloss paint so they look nice and clean for you*.

But I think they're going to need another coat. So unless you want paint marks on your luggage I'd leave it as late as possible to give it time to dry properly.



*As ever, the most difficult bit was getting the surface prepared for the paint. Some of those marbles have really fiddly areas, and it's a bugger to get the sandpaper into them. Lucky the chief curator from the Egyptian collection turned up with the whirly disk on the end of a cordless drill he uses to clear the splinters off the sarcophaguses, or we'd still be there now.


Righteo... Thanks, I'll just cancel my order for this:

Blast Media Aluminum Oxide 50 lb
item no: 22021
Was: $38.99
Now: $35.09
More Information
Qty.

You might tell your Keeper of Egyptian stuff that sand blasting really results in a nice smooth, paint ready, finish. You go thru about 16 levels of grit and don't have to remove more than 1/2" from the object. It's so easy that you can get illiterate illeagal immigrants to knock it off in a morning for a song.

As a side light and for fun, don't give them any instructions whatsoever. When they "test" the flow of abrasive they will loose fingers and hands much to the merriment of onlookers. If you are fortunate, one of them will drop the nozzle doohickie and it will flail about causing general consarnation amoungst the dusky rabble.

Good fun and inexpensive.

[Cleopatra]

Ed

Now that you will have them, you can paint them every color you wish.

Nobody will be able to accuse you that you are another American with horrific taste for doing so :p :p

[Giz]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
[B]

Bold face mine: This is bibliographically known as : The white marbles syndrome :)

All the Ancient Greek statues were painted in bright unnatural colors. Hair were painted blue or red and the face was enhanced with "unnatural" colors.



They really have lost their marbles...

The Parthenon in its heyday must have looked like a cross between some garish neon lit club and a contender for the turner prize! No wonder the Persians were worried about the Greeks, I'd rather have a McDonalds on every corner than a freshly daubed Parthenon!

[Ed]

Originally posted by Giz


They really have lost their marbles...

The Parthenon in its heyday must have looked like a cross between some garish neon lit club and a contender for the turner prize! No wonder the Persians were worried about the Greeks, I'd rather have a McDonalds on every corner than a freshly daubed Parthenon!

A little known fact is that it was a bordello.

It's slogan was

"Be aware of bare Greek gits"

Which became, as we all know

"Beware of Greeks bearing Gifts"

You are welcome.

[El Greco]

Well, I think that we may have a hope to get them back, just not all of them. I think that Greek goverments have failed to comprehend this simple fact: The British don't actually want to keep all the marbles! It's just the boys they're interested in!

Ok, give us back the Caryatid, most of the frieze and the metopes, and you can keep all naked statues.

Fair enough ? :D

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Giz


They really have lost their marbles...

The Parthenon in its heyday must have looked like a cross between some garish neon lit club and a contender for the turner prize! No wonder the Persians were worried about the Greeks, I'd rather have a McDonalds on every corner than a freshly daubed Parthenon!


HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

The entablature ( this is how is called the upper part of an ancient temple, the part that starts where the columns end) was painted in blue and golden colors. We are talking about the ultimate kitsch :p

Greeks knew that their creations were devine... they didn't belong to this world and everybody should know that.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by El Greco
Well, I think that we may have a hope to get them back, just not all of them. I think that Greek goverments have failed to comprehend this simple fact: The British don't actually want to keep all the marbles! It's just the boys they're interested in!

Ok, give us back the Caryatid, most of the frieze and the metopes, and you can keep all naked statues.

Fair enough ? :D


LOL I am on the floor now LOLing! Let's hope that Tim doesn't see that LOLOL

[Cleopatra]

Please vote for the return of the Marbles of Parthenon to Greece. :)

The British Comittee for the Restitution of the Parthenon Marbles. (http://www.parthenonuk.com/vote_now.php)

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Please vote for the return of the Marbles of Parthenon to Greece. :)

The British Comittee for the Restitution of the Parthenon Marbles. (http://www.parthenonuk.com/vote_now.php)

You are joking, right?

You are lucky we didn't move the whole damn Acropolis to Tampa. As it is we are awash in Greeks.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Please vote for the return of the Marbles of Parthenon to Greece. :)

The British Comittee for the Restitution of the Parthenon Marbles. (http://www.parthenonuk.com/vote_now.php)

They say, on your obviously uzo addled site:

"Do you believe that the Parthenon Marbles should be returned to Greece and housed in a properly constructed museum in Athens? "

You know the liklihood of that museum being constructed is about on a par with the liklihood of the Demeter statue regrowing arms, don't you?

Give it up, wallow in wine. Get a life. Sell the rest of the stuff.

[Cleopatra]

What do you want them Ed? Does your President need the Marbles to carve the Ten Commandments or the Amended Constitution that will forbid you to breathe?

http://www.handykult.de/plaudersmilies.de/jestera.gif

[Ed]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
What do you want them Ed? Does your President need the Marbles to carve the Ten Commandments or the Amended Constitution that will forbid you to breathe?

http://www.handykult.de/plaudersmilies.de/jestera.gif

What or when? ASAP, please.

It has nothing to do with my president, only my insatiable greed.

[epepke]

Originally posted by headscratcher4
Given, for a moment, that it is all true. The Turks were terrible custodians of the Greek patrimony. They were ruthless occupiers who destroyed not only Greek Christian culture but also classical culture.

Wow.

I point out that western nations -- including Great Britain -- have not been particularlly good at managing historical patrimony either.

I have a question.

When I was growing up, Greece was considered, if not the cradle, then at least the crib and the walking-around-toddler-thingie of Western civilization.

When I went to University, it was considered the place of Dead White European Males attempting to detract from the supercooled supercomputers invented in what is now called Botswana 400,000 years ago.

Since when did Greece become Not Western™ any more? I've seen lots of people, all of whom are under 30, phrasing arguments as if Greece weren't Western. It must have happened within the past five years or so, because up until then, I was paying attention to the fashions of idiots.

[lionking]

Yeah zombie thread and all, but I have just watched a documentary about the Elgin Marbles. I had the great pleasure of seeing them in the British Museum. But should they now go back to Greece?

[Darat]

At the moment I don't think Greece could pay the transport costs... :(

[lionking]

At the moment I don't think Greece could pay the transport costs... :(
Yeeeees, no doubt right.

How much would you mob pay to keep them then?

[Lothian]

Yeeeees, no doubt right.

How much would you mob pay to keep them then?We have already bought them, paid in full.

[lionking]

We have already bought them, paid in full.
Seriously?

[Foolmewunz]

At the moment I don't think Greece could pay the transport costs... :(

Check the basement of the museum. I'm sure you have some of their boats and barges and stuff and could use them to return them.

Alternately, the rental of the Marbles at, say, 40,000 pounds a year.... That oughta about pay for the return freight. (A single 20' container Felixstowe to Piraeus is about 500 pounds.)

[Lothian]

Seriously?Yes, we bought them off the Turks.

[lionking]

Okay, to be serious, I can't see why the Marbles can't be put on display in a similar museum in Athens.

[Lothian]

Okay, to be serious, I can't see why the Marbles can't be put on display in a similar museum in Athens.Do you think all museum artefacts should be returned to the place from where they were purchased or is it only the stuff in British museums?

[lionking]

Do you think all museum artefacts should be returned to the place from where they were purchased or is it only the stuff in British museums?
I can't see why all artifacts can't be returned provided they can be displayed and preserved appropriately.

[Lothian]

I can't see why all artifacts can't be returned provided they can be displayed and preserved appropriately.I don't think it would do much for multiculturalism if to see something Greek you have to go to Greece. Not every one can afford to tour the world in order to see and understand other culture's history. It is far easier to come to London and see it all in one place.

Although the idea of exporting all Australian larger back to Oz is appealing.

[Foolmewunz]

Yes, we bought them off the Turks.

No. You bought them off Lord Elgin. Him wot has his name associated with them? And he didn't pay the Turks a cent for them, although he spent a boatload of his own money in the hacking up of the Parthenon to get at them.

He had trouble convincing the British Museum to buy them, so sold them ultimately for less than the cost of the transport, so you Presbyterianed him down to fire sale rates.

(Elgin, in all fairness, refused to consider selling them to anyone else. That Bonaparte fella wanted them, but he wouldn't consider anything other than the British Museum.)

[Lothian]

No. You bought them off Lord Elgin. He was the shipping agent.

And he didn't pay the Turks a cent for them Hang on now and slow down with the accusations. He bribed those Turkish officials fair and square.

[GlennB]

Interestingly it seems we Brits are somewhat in favour of their return

( from the Wiki article here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles#Legality_of_the_removal_from_Athens) ) :


40% in favour of returning the marbles to Greece
15% in favour of keeping them at the British Museum
18% would not vote
27% had no opinion
A more recent opinion poll in 2002 (again carried out by MORI) showed similar results, with 40% in favour of returning the marbles to Greece, 16% in favour of keeping them within Britain and the remainder either having no opinion or would not vote. .....

[Jekyll's Guest]

Take them by force, make a trade, or use diplomacy/public opinion to have them returned. Otherwise, clear off.

Practically everything on Earth was swiped from someone else at one time or another. If Greece wants to start the ball rolling by returning every item its citizens ever nicked from someone else, then we'll talk.

[Jekyll's Guest]

I can't see why all artifacts can't be returned provided they can be displayed and preserved appropriately.

So we'll just get every museum on Earth to play swopsies until everything has gone back to where it originated.

Let's end war and famine when we're done with that.

[lionking]

So we'll just get every museum on Earth to play swopsies until everything has gone back to where it originated.

Let's end war and famine when we're done with that.
Yeah, that's what I meant. Sarcasm noted and ignored.

[Jekyll's Guest]

Yeah, that's what I meant. Sarcasm noted and ignored.

So what did you mean?

Just these items should be returned?

If so please give reasons why these particular artifacts should be returned, but every other museum on Earth gets a pass.

[lionking]

So what did you mean?

Just these items should be returned?

If so please give reasons why these particular artifacts should be returned, but every other museum on Earth gets a pass.

If you bothered to read what I posted, I asked a question.

To answer my own question, yes I think the Elgin marbles should be returned, particularly as Greece has (or soon will have, I haven't looked it up) a museum which will do them justice.

[Foolmewunz]

Take them by force, make a trade, or use diplomacy/public opinion to have them returned. Otherwise, clear off.

Practically everything on Earth was swiped from someone else at one time or another. If Greece wants to start the ball rolling by returning every item its citizens ever nicked from someone else, then we'll talk.

Yes. You think it's a sarcastic and facetious suggestion, but I don't. Every art work that was stolen from someone else should be returned, IMHO.

The party who currently owns it, if they can prove that they paid for it even under dubious circumstances, deserves to have their filthy lucre returned, so the Greeks (as in this instance) should have to set up a fund to buy them back, but they should go back.

Notice I say "stolen", by which I also include "plundered". That old Might Makes Right crap pretty much sucks as justification.

The Chinese, Burmese, Greeks, Egyptians, Indians, Aboriginals, etc.... All their plundered loot that's in the Louvre or the British Museum or the Metropolitan in NYC.... Needs to be repatriated.

The arguments by England in favor (favour) of keeping it are the most absurd Kiplingesque uber colonial I-miss-my-empire nonsense I've ever heard. My favorite being - "Hey why should one have to travel the world to see the world's culture when it can all be in one place, here at the British Museum".
Such charming arrogance.

Oh, wait, my favorite argument is actually the "But our charter doesn't allow us to repatriate artworks, no matter how we acquired them".... Wow! Legal hair-splitting.

Give 'em back their marbles! And instead of wasting all your holiday money going to Spain and turning into lobsters, or following the Lions around the globe, you can all go to Cairo and Athens to learn your history. Ditto for those folks in Paris and in New York City and in Berlin. If someone stole it and you bought it. You need to find a way to repatriate it - and get reimbursed - but repatriate it.

[Tatyana]

I note that by the logic of the argument for keeping the treasure, we (the US) should gather together all of Iraq's treasures and establish it in a museum (in Texas) for its own preservation. The next despot of Iraq will sell chuncks of it off...just like Saddam. They don't know how to care for it...clearly. Besides, we won it fair and square when we saved the Iragi's from Saddam.



I wish you had, the great museum there was destroyed and looted.

There are antiquities from the cradle of modern civilisation that we will never have again.

[DC]

where would we end up if we gave back al the stolen things....

[lionking]

where would we end up if we gave back al the stolen things....
You'd end up with a sense of justice.

[Foolmewunz]

where would we end up if we gave back al the stolen things....

Still losing 0-1 to Chile.:D

[Lothian]

There must be some civilised way to sort this out.

How about if we send the Greeks a double decker bus, an old police box (just like the tardis - appeals to kids), a model of tower bridge and a post box. They can stick them in their own museum and we are quits.

[Foolmewunz]

There must be some civilised way to sort this out.

How about if we send the Greeks a double decker bus, an old police box (just like the tardis - appeals to kids), a model of tower bridge and a post box. They can stick them in their own museum and we are quits.

Do the Onasis kids still have a few billion lying around?

Maybe they could give you fifty million Euros and come up with a piece of willow bark with some old runes on it, translated by a shipping clerk in Genoa and purportedly saying "Yeah, go ahead,... take 'em. They're just a bunch of old rocks (to do like Elgin and give the thing some semblance of legality)."

And with that, they can have Stonehenge. That area would make a lovely Tesco. And why should the people in the Eastern Med have to travel all the way to England to see ruins of pre-written history. I mean, we could have the Parthenon AND Stonehenge in the same building!

[Lothian]

And with that, they can have Stonehenge. That area would make a lovely Tesco. Don't be silly Tesco already has a 58% Market share in the area. The Local Chamber of commerce did a poll that showed most residents want an Asda.

And why should the people in the Eastern Med have to travel all the way to England to see ruins of pre-written history. I mean, we could have the Parthenon AND Stonehenge in the same building!Fine by me but could we get an offer quickly? The Chancellor is making a budget speech at the moment so before he commits to increasing taxes we need to tell him we might have found some more income.

[Jekyll's Guest]

I can't see why all artifacts can't be returned provided they can be displayed and preserved appropriately.

If you bothered to read what I posted, I asked a question.

To answer my own question, yes I think the Elgin marbles should be returned, particularly as Greece has (or soon will have, I haven't looked it up) a museum which will do them justice.

If you had asked a question, you would have used one of these >?<

What you made was a statement, that you see no reason not to return them.

Try this for a reason: museums stay open by getting visitors. They get visitors by having exhibitions people want to see. They are not going to damage their funding just because some people think they should have some kind of unique moral code.


Yes. You think it's a sarcastic and facetious suggestion, but I don't. Every art work that was stolen from someone else should be returned, IMHO.

I don't find either of your arguments sarcastic or facetious, I'm sure they're genuine and well meaning. I do find them childlike and naive though.

Yes, it would of course be wonderful if everyone in the world would return what was stolen.

Let's take it to the next logical step though.

The land your house is on, was anyone ever cheated out of it? Would you give them your house?

Is your wife's wedding ring an antique? Better be prepared to give it up if someone has a 100 year old right to it.

You'll no doubt label these ideas as somehow being hyperbole, but they're really not.

Everything old belonged to someone else at one time or another, and picking and choosing what should be returned, using only your personal moral compass, is nonsensical.

[Tricky]

Were they made by Goblins?

[Giz]

I don't find either of your arguments sarcastic or facetious, I'm sure they're genuine and well meaning. I do find them childlike and naive though.

Yes, it would of course be wonderful if everyone in the world would return what was stolen.

Let's take it to the next logical step though.

The land your house is on, was anyone ever cheated out of it? Would you give them your house?

Is your wife's wedding ring an antique? Better be prepared to give it up if someone has a 100 year old right to it.

You'll no doubt label these ideas as somehow being hyperbole, but they're really not.

Everything old belonged to someone else at one time or another, and picking and choosing what should be returned, using only your personal moral compass, is nonsensical.

Very true.

People should really learn to let go. Bad stuff happened in the past, and there is no way of putting it all to rights. I would suggest an "is there anyone still alive" test; if there are any of the impacted generation still surviving then lets talk... otherwise the Welsh will be claiming all of England back of those Anglo-saxon types, 99% of the USA will have to wander off somewhere, heck - even the Greeks only moved into Greece in 2nd or 3rd millenium BC (supplanting the existing pre-greek population), so quite where they'd put the ex-Elgin Marbles is a worry... obviously the Parthanon would have to be packed up and shipped somewhere...

[Mark6]

How did they lose their marbles in the first place? :D

[Tatyana]

If you had asked a question, you would have used one of these >?<

What you made was a statement, that you see no reason not to return them.

Try this for a reason: museums stay open by getting visitors. They get visitors by having exhibitions people want to see. They are not going to damage their funding just because some people think they should have some kind of unique moral code.




I don't find either of your arguments sarcastic or facetious, I'm sure they're genuine and well meaning. I do find them childlike and naive though.

Yes, it would of course be wonderful if everyone in the world would return what was stolen.

Let's take it to the next logical step though.

The land your house is on, was anyone ever cheated out of it? Would you give them your house?

Is your wife's wedding ring an antique? Better be prepared to give it up if someone has a 100 year old right to it.

You'll no doubt label these ideas as somehow being hyperbole, but they're really not.

Everything old belonged to someone else at one time or another, and picking and choosing what should be returned, using only your personal moral compass, is nonsensical.

Very true. Major art works are stolen all the time.

I think that there is a 10 year moratorium on stolen art in quite a few European countries.

The original museums and galleries can then buy back the stolen art or artifacts, no questions asked.

[Foolmewunz]

If you had asked a question, you would have used one of these >?<

What you made was a statement, that you see no reason not to return them.

Try this for a reason: museums stay open by getting visitors. They get visitors by having exhibitions people want to see. They are not going to damage their funding just because some people think they should have some kind of unique moral code.




I don't find either of your arguments sarcastic or facetious, I'm sure they're genuine and well meaning. I do find them childlike and naive though.

Yes, it would of course be wonderful if everyone in the world would return what was stolen.

Let's take it to the next logical step though.

The land your house is on, was anyone ever cheated out of it? Would you give them your house?

Is your wife's wedding ring an antique? Better be prepared to give it up if someone has a 100 year old right to it.

You'll no doubt label these ideas as somehow being hyperbole, but they're really not.

Everything old belonged to someone else at one time or another, and picking and choosing what should be returned, using only your personal moral compass, is nonsensical.

Berlin returned a royal sarcophagus to Egypt. They got reimbursed for it. China is trying to buy back its antiquities where it can. So are the Greeks.

No one is saying "Give them back".... (Well, some are, but no one in the museum/arts field.)

My house has clear documents of title that date back 150 years (it's a coop in an old building in New York City), can we say that about the Elgin Marbles? The British Museum paid for them, and should be reimbursed those costs plus the loss of the attraction at some mutually agreeable price.

If someone shows up with a clear document of title and chain-of-possession to a Rembrandt stolen from someone by the nazis in Stettin, then my belief is that that person has a right to that painting. But personal possessions are quite different from national possessions. Yes, I know what the laws have had to say on the subject, but the law, as was pointed out by a famous British writer, is an ass.

The Turkish conquerors gave Elgin dubious authorization in the first place. Not to mention that I'm not real big on the rights of a conqueror to cut up the cultural and historical monuments of the conquered and sell them off. By that account, the big bad neighbor (China or Viet Nam or Thailand) can go waltzing into Cambodia and take Angkor Wat, I guess. It'd make a lovely theme park in Urumqi.

And there are ways to work these things out to the satisfaction of the museums that hold the pieces of dubious documentation. Egypt and China trade off the old touring exhibition game. "Here, you give us that musty old dead body. We'll let you send your touring exhibit "Treasures of the Bauhaus" for a seven week run in the Museum in Cairo, and when we launch our Ancients of the Pyramids traveling road show, you'll get two months during prime museum season (May to October, generally). The Chinese are cooking similar deals.

Ergo, I'm not arguing that the financials shouldn't or can't be worked out. I'm arguing against the pompous gits who say "We stole 'em? Too bad! We won't even discuss the subject."

I'd love to see the English reaction if the Nazis had invaded and looted the British Museum or the Tower. Let's say Thierry Henry turns up owning the Magna Carta, which he paid ten million Euros for. Let him keep it? Or how about the Canadians sacking Washington AND Philly and taking the Liberty Bell which was found being used as a doorstop in a Tim Duncan's in Winnipeg? Leave it? They stole it fair and square and it might be an important symbolic national treasure, but heck that Tim Ducan's gets four customers a week who admire it, so they oughta keep it.

[Damien Evans]

Very true.

People should really learn to let go. Bad stuff happened in the past, and there is no way of putting it all to rights. I would suggest an "is there anyone still alive" test; if there are any of the impacted generation still surviving then lets talk... otherwise the Welsh will be claiming all of England back of those Anglo-saxon types, 99% of the USA will have to wander off somewhere, heck - even the Greeks only moved into Greece in 2nd or 3rd millenium BC (supplanting the existing pre-greek population), so quite where they'd put the ex-Elgin Marbles is a worry... obviously the Parthanon would have to be packed up and shipped somewhere...

And 95% of the population of Australia would have to leave...

[geni]

Let's say Thierry Henry turns up owning the Magna Carta, which he paid ten million Euros for. Let him keep it?

Given how much a 1297 copy was sold for (the original has been lost) 10 million euros would be pretty good value.

[DC]

You'd end up with a sense of justice.

Would you really want to life in such a world? :D

[DC]

Still losing 0-1 to Chile.:D

you are a very very mean person ;)

[Giz]

My house has clear documents of title that date back 150 years

...

The Turkish conquerors gave Elgin dubious authorization in the first place.

The Turks had been in Greece for far longer than 150 years when Elgin showed up. When are you going to give your apartment in NY back to the Native Americans and vacate the USA?

[Giz]

And 95% of the population of Australia would have to leave...

Bloody hell, think of all the jails we'd have to build if we had to put them back where their ancestors came from!!

[Damien Evans]

Bloody hell, think of all the jails we'd have to build if we had to put them back where their ancestors came from!!

maybe 5.

[Matthew Best]

When I was wandering around the temple of Karnak, I lost count of the number of times I heard the words "there used to be two of these, but the other one is in the British Museum". As the British Museum was about 5 minutes walk from my flat I started to think this was a holiday I perhaps could have thought twice about. But then I wouldn't have been able to visit the Valley of the Kings....

[Jekyll's Guest]

When I was wandering around the temple of Karnak, I lost count of the number of times I heard the words "there used to be two of these, but the other one is in the British Museum". As the British Museum was about 5 minutes walk from my flat I started to think this was a holiday I perhaps could have thought twice about. But then I wouldn't have been able to visit the Valley of the Kings....

I know there's a lot of talk about the British museum pinching stuff, and damaging stuff, but it's hardly like they were safe and sound in responsible hands.

Tomb robbers and treasure seekers wrecked a lot of antiquity, lots of things were left to crumble to dust or broken down for building materials, and the countries of origin liked to flog them to all and sundry without asking if they had a long term preservation goal or not.

As ham-fisted as the proto-archaeologists were, they actually saved a lot of things that the locals either didn't care about or wouldn't bother to properly protect. Yeah you had awful things like Carter ripping up mummies to get at the jewelry, but it's not as if the Egyptian officials wouldn't have done the same thing 90 years ago.

[Jekyll's Guest]

The Turks had been in Greece for far longer than 150 years when Elgin showed up. When are you going to give your apartment in NY back to the Native Americans and vacate the USA?

Never.

Because it's pick and choose morality day.

[Travis]

So was my family abetting cultural plunder when we paid good money to see the Tut exhibit in San Francisco?


Also isn't Peru demanding the return of the stuff from Machu Picchu?

[Foolmewunz]

The Turks had been in Greece for far longer than 150 years when Elgin showed up. When are you going to give your apartment in NY back to the Native Americans and vacate the USA?

Do you understand what I was talking about?

Title? Permission? The length of their stay in Greece has nothing to do with it. Elgin did not actually have permission to hack up the Parthenon and remove massive portions of it to England.

But thanks for dropping in.

[Foolmewunz]

Never.

Because it's pick and choose morality day.

No, apparently, it's knit up a strawman day. Be a mensch and retract that, please.

Would you mind if I answered questions that are addressed to me? I mean I acknowledge that you're smarter than all the rest of us, but I can at least give it a good try. Just don' use no big words and stuff, 'kay?


Giz... I'll give up my apartment to the Native American, Polish person, Zimbabwean or Venezuelan who shows up with an actual deed and title to it or proof that someone stole it from them. But, I'll expect to be reimbursed for it, to the tune of what I paid into it, because I have every reason, including authorization from the City and State, to believe that I made an honest transaction.

[Foolmewunz]

So was my family abetting cultural plunder when we paid good money to see the Tut exhibit in San Francisco?


Also isn't Peru demanding the return of the stuff from Machu Picchu?

You do realize that the Tut artifacts are in the Egyptian Museum in, uh,... Cairo (the one in Egypt, not Illinois). So, no... you may have been abetting Indiana Jones wannabes, but I think the money you spent went to the local museum in SFO and they, in turn, paid the Egyptians.

[Aepervius]

We didn't do a very good job with preserving the Elgin Marbles, though. It's pretty lucky it wasn't 'improved' to have a Union Flag backdrop to the entire thing, with any female profile changed to that of Queen Victoria. Didn't we cheat to get our hands on the marbles anyway?

If, for example, the Germans had won WWII and walked off with Nelson's Column, we'd probably want it back, so I can understand why the Greeks might feel the same about the Elgin Marbles.

More like if somebody had "bought" something from occupation/invading regime back in 1800 and then the origin country wanted it back now in 2000. It is even more clear cut than mummy digging back in egypt.

It is clear cut case IMHO of looting and the correct way would be to give back the stuff if requested by the greek.

[Aepervius]

Do you understand what I was talking about?

Title? Permission? The length of their stay in Greece has nothing to do with it. Elgin did not actually have permission to hack up the Parthenon and remove massive portions of it to England.

But thanks for dropping in.

Wiki beg to differ if I read it correctly. It could be a case of wiki being wrong. Do you have reference saying otherwise ?

"Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1799–1803, had obtained a controversial permission from the Ottoman authorities to remove pieces from the Acropolis."


ETA:

You are actualy right. Emphasis mine.

Lord Elgin decided to carry out the work at his own expense and employed artists to take casts and drawings under the supervision of the Neapolitan court painter Giovani Lusieri.[4] However, while conducting surveys, he found that Parthenon statuary that had been documented in a 17th century survey was now missing, and so he investigated. According to a Turkish local, marble sculptures that fell were burned to obtain lime for building.[4] Although the original intention was only to document the sculptures, in 1801 Lord Elgin began to remove material from the Parthenon and its surrounding structures[12] under the supervision of Lusieri.

The excavation and removal was completed in 1812 at a personal cost of £74,240 (about $4 million in today's currency).[13] Elgin intended the marbles for display in the British Museum, selling them to the British government for less than the cost of bringing them to Britain and declining higher offers from other potential buyers, including Napoleon.[12]

Then if you read below it isn't clear he got any ACTUAL authorisation to remove the marble. So I take it back.


scroll down to "Despite the controversial firman, many have questioned the legality of Elgin's actions." and read.

[Foolmewunz]

No, Wiki's got it fairly accurate. I'd gotten into this topic a long time ago, after seeing a bad TV show that made Elgin out to be Snidely Whiplash. I wanted to find out what it was all about.

I don't think he was an evil schemer, just an arrogant imperialist. I think he knew that what he was doing was probably illegal, but like many people of that era, figured that such culturally significant artifacts would be better off out of the hot sun of the Mediterranean and in the pristine clean air of London.

I think the firman in question is a bit of a joke, and he looked at it and decided he had some loopholes that he could sail a few cargo ships through, and started slicing the place up. Exaggerated accounts say they did more damage disassembling the Marbles than had been done by the previous fifteen hundred generations that had been through there. Nonsense. But, they do have a point. He (the people working for him) hacked the place up pretty badly.

Hindsight is always 20/20, but as it turns out, the Marbles would've been better off left in situ. The restoration work done on them in England was a disaster. In fairness, the Greeks didn't do a damned thing to restore what were left in Greece, but in retrospect, that was a good thing because by the time they awakened from their slumber, the laser had been invented.

The only supportable argument I've seen offered by anyone to the east of complete jingoists is that the precedent could mean the death of museums as we know them. To that I respond, Not Bloody Likely! There are thousands upon thousands of legitimately acquired pieces in museums and in legitimately acquired private collections. Paintings, sculpture, local artifacts, etc... Further, the Egyptians, say, have hundreds and hundreds (probably thousands and thousands) of mummies and sarcophagi (sarcophaguses?), and if you just wanna have some relics, I'm sure they'll be happy to sell you some, or trade off, say, a low-end Winslow Homer for an ancient wall mural.

And, again, for the pillage and plunder fans.... the home countries/societies should be prepared to pay for the articles. If they can't afford to, then that UN World Cultural Site tribe ought to get to it and/or private philanthropies. Cambodia would be a good example. Big ol' hunks of various Wats are in gardens all over Europe. I'm sure they're in any number of museums, also. Cambodia can't bid on the stuff, so they need a private initiative. But since Mme Maisonette didn't go over and steal the stuff, herself, but bought it from a little shop just off the Bois de Boulogne, she should be reimbursed, not forced into giving it away.

[Giz]

Do you understand what I was talking about?

Title? Permission? The length of their stay in Greece has nothing to do with it. Elgin did not actually have permission to hack up the Parthenon and remove massive portions of it to England.

But thanks for dropping in.

So you only care about the last transaction? (this is getting more off the wall all the time). Many Americans have title (going back a century or two). But how many have valid title from the Native Americans who were there first? Far more likely the land was conquered or swindled hmmm... but if it was a while ago that some dodgy deal was done then that makes all the regular title deeds that follow totally legitimate?

Unless the dodgy dealing was somewhere else, in which case length of stay has nothing to do with it!

Perhaps it's not just Elgin being arrogant?

[defaultdotxbe]

Do you understand what I was talking about?

Title? Permission? The length of their stay in Greece has nothing to do with it. Elgin did not actually have permission to hack up the Parthenon and remove massive portions of it to England.

But thanks for dropping in.
its my understanding that the purchase of the marbles is in dispute, not that its been proven one way or the other



honestly id have to say in this case possession is 9/10ths of the law, and the other 1/10th has been dead for over 2000 years, i just dont see modern greece as a proper successor government to classical athens to be able to claim ownership

[Travis]

You do realize that the Tut artifacts are in the Egyptian Museum in, uh,... Cairo (the one in Egypt, not Illinois). So, no... you may have been abetting Indiana Jones wannabes, but I think the money you spent went to the local museum in SFO and they, in turn, paid the Egyptians.

Actually it was the real Tut stuff. It was on loan from Egypt...and was was pretty cool too.

[Foolmewunz]

So you only care about the last transaction? (this is getting more off the wall all the time). Many Americans have title (going back a century or two). But how many have valid title from the Native Americans who were there first? Far more likely the land was conquered or swindled hmmm... but if it was a while ago that some dodgy deal was done then that makes all the regular title deeds that follow totally legitimate?

Unless the dodgy dealing was somewhere else, in which case length of stay has nothing to do with it!

Perhaps it's not just Elgin being arrogant?

Google up the legendary purchase of Manhattan.

And as I said, if someone shows up with proof that somehow my property was something that they or their ancestors were swindled out of or had stolen from them, and I get recompensed, then I would give it up.

So where's the arrogance in that? You really ought to make sure your clever repartee makes sense, as otherwise it really is just the written equivalent of an "Oh, yeah?" argument. My stand sounds downright humble to me in an awshucks ain't that nice sort of way. And why not? If I get back the fair value of the property and it really did belong to someone else? Sounds fair.

Your version is called finders keepers/losers weepers (or as I mentioned earlier, "Might Makes Right"). I'm kinda hoping we've progressed beyond that ethos, but that's just me, apparently.

[Jekyll's Guest]

Do you understand what I was talking about?

Title? Permission? The length of their stay in Greece has nothing to do with it. Elgin did not actually have permission to hack up the Parthenon and remove massive portions of it to England.

But thanks for dropping in.

So, if 200 years ago a government official had given Elgin permission to remove them (which Elgin alleged, and others alleged to have proof of) the museum could then keep them?

No, apparently, it's knit up a strawman day. Be a mensch and retract that, please.

Would you mind if I answered questions that are addressed to me? I mean I acknowledge that you're smarter than all the rest of us, but I can at least give it a good try. Just don' use no big words and stuff, 'kay?

I have no idea as to how smart you may or may not be, you seem pretty rational in other threads, and seem to at have all cylinders firing, I simply think that in this matter you have a 'horse in the race' and critical thinking has gone out the window.

My stance is not that that Elgin was definitely in the right, but rather than most things you see in a museum were 'stolen', and you'd have to live in cloud Cuckoo land to think all the museums are going to start giving them back (even for a reimbursement).

If you're not suggesting EVERYONE give EVERYTHING back, then you're just picking on the British Museum.

Giz... I'll give up my apartment to the Native American, Polish person, Zimbabwean or Venezuelan who shows up with an actual deed and title to it or proof that someone stole it from them. But, I'll expect to be reimbursed for it, to the tune of what I paid into it, because I have every reason, including authorization from the City and State, to believe that I made an honest transaction.

There's about as much evidence for Elgin legitimately taking the marbles as there is for the legitimacy of the purchase of Manhattan. New York City is just an extension of that original settlement.

So unless you support returning the city to the Lenape for $1,000 (Yes, that's adjusted for hundreds of years of inflation), you're being morally inconsistent.

That's not even getting in to the 'legitimacy' of the British taking it from the Dutch, or the revolutionary Americans taking it from the British.

Why is it not stealing just because you use an army and force a signing of a document?

You do realize that the Tut artifacts are in the Egyptian Museum in, uh,... Cairo (the one in Egypt, not Illinois). So, no... you may have been abetting Indiana Jones wannabes, but I think the money you spent went to the local museum in SFO and they, in turn, paid the Egyptians.

They toured the U.S., for the first time since the 70's.

I saw them at the Dallas Museum of art, with my wife. We were herded through like cattle, but the artifacts were spectacular and well worth the possible once in a lifetime experience.

Hindsight is always 20/20, but as it turns out, the Marbles would've been better off left in situ.

Are we playing 'what if'?

What if the Turks had smashed them all out of spite when being pushed out?

What if the Nazi's had bombed them to dust?

What if...the Greeks had cut them up and flogged them off themselves.

I don't think he was an evil schemer, just an arrogant imperialist.

----

The only supportable argument I've seen offered by anyone to the east of complete jingoists...

----

And, again, for the pillage and plunder fans...

I think these quotes show how biased you are on the subject, not to mention that you feel the need to personally slander anyone who disagrees with your 'truth'.

So you only care about the last transaction? (this is getting more off the wall all the time). Many Americans have title (going back a century or two). But how many have valid title from the Native Americans who were there first? Far more likely the land was conquered or swindled hmmm... but if it was a while ago that some dodgy deal was done then that makes all the regular title deeds that follow totally legitimate?

Unless the dodgy dealing was somewhere else, in which case length of stay has nothing to do with it!

Perhaps it's not just Elgin being arrogant?

As I said earlier, I see no moral consistency at all.

its my understanding that the purchase of the marbles is in dispute, not that its been proven one way or the other

honestly id have to say in this case possession is 9/10ths of the law, and the other 1/10th has been dead for over 2000 years, i just dont see modern greece as a proper successor government to classical athens to be able to claim ownership

This.

And as I said, if someone shows up with proof that somehow my property was something that they or their ancestors were swindled out of or had stolen from them, and I get recompensed, then I would give it up.

$1,000. Share it with all your neighbors evenly.

[Foolmewunz]

its my understanding that the purchase of the marbles is in dispute, not that its been proven one way or the other



honestly id have to say in this case possession is 9/10ths of the law, and the other 1/10th has been dead for over 2000 years, i just dont see modern greece as a proper successor government to classical athens to be able to claim ownership


The purchase of the Elgin Marbles is not in dispute.
The British Museum bought them from Elgin. What is in dispute is whether or not Elgin had a right to them. And it is disputed on both fronts - the legal front saying that the document he CLAIMS TO HAVE HAD (he never produced it, but someone else who conveniently worked for Elgin came up with a translation of said document), and the moral - e.g. should he have done so based on one's particular view of the situation being discussed in this thread. The latter, of course, is totally subjective.

[Foolmewunz]

The Brit Museum paid the equivalent in today's currency of several million dollars for the marbles. My apartment has been appraised at a few bucks more than the thousand. If the British Museum could get returned value, then I think they should be returned.

There are no N.A. claims filed against Manhattan as far as I know. (I think my building's on landfill, anyway.) But if someone has a claim and someone or some government recompenses me? Sure, take it.

And, yes, as I said earlier.... All museums should follow the same policy. WTF do I care if the French or English or Americans get to see a sarcophagus up close in their own backyards?

GOAL - USA!!!!


And I'm not talking about purchased works of art, which are very common in museums. I'm talking about something stolen from someone, whether it's a cat burglar, an invading army, or a saintly Laird who thought he was doing the noble thing be removing parts of the Parthenon from harms way.

[Jekyll's Guest]

The Brit Museum paid the equivalent in today's currency of several million dollars for the marbles. My apartment has been appraised at a few bucks more than the thousand. If the British Museum could get returned value, then I think they should be returned.

The Indians who lived on the land were paid equivalent of $1,000 of today's currency. It doesn't matter how much your place is worth after changing through hundreds of hands. It's the original 'sale' that is bogus.

There are no N.A. claims filed against Manhattan as far as I know. (I think my building's on landfill, anyway.) But if someone has a claim and someone or some government recompenses me? Sure, take it.

Only because anyone saying 'I want Manhattan back, here's a thousand bucks' is rightly laughed out of court.

And, yes, as I said earlier.... All museums should follow the same policy. WTF do I care if the French or English or Americans get to see a sarcophagus up close in their own backyards?

GOAL - USA!!!!

Luckily the world does not revolve around you and your bizarre and patchy personal moral code.

You're on a skeptics forum, arguing that the museums of the world should just return everything to their 'rightful owners'. The mind boggles.


And I'm not talking about purchased works of art, which are very common in museums. I'm talking about something stolen from someone, whether it's a cat burglar, an invading army, or a saintly Laird who thought he was doing the noble thing be removing parts of the Parthenon from harms way.

Again with the zany 'once stolen crap has passed through a few legitimate hands and built up paperwork it's A-OK' line of reasoning.

[defaultdotxbe]

The purchase of the Elgin Marbles is not in dispute.
The British Museum bought them from Elgin.
you previusly that wiki was "fairly accurate" (i realize wiki is written by multiple authors, but i myself have found it accurate on on subjects)

wiki states citing this article: (http://www.elginism.com/20070401/702/)
That the marbles may have been obtained illegally and hence should be returned to their rightful owner
(bolding mine)
since you state the purchase of them by the british museum is not in question, this can only refer to lord elgin purchase from the ottoman empire

What is in dispute is whether or not Elgin had a right to them.
ah, so now you agree that is whats in dispute, but earlier you said:
Elgin did not actually have permission to hack up the Parthenon and remove massive portions of it to England.
which would seem to indicate you feel this is not in dispute

[Foolmewunz]

you previusly that wiki was "fairly accurate" (i realize wiki is written by multiple authors, but i myself have found it accurate on on subjects)

wiki states citing this article: (http://www.elginism.com/20070401/702/)

(bolding mine)
since you state the purchase of them by the british museum is not in question, this can only refer to lord elgin purchase from the ottoman empire


ah, so now you agree that is whats in dispute, but earlier you said:

which would seem to indicate you feel this is not in dispute

Correct on all counts. I mentioned above that the moral issue is purely subjective, but the legal one, I feel, is pretty clear. If I wasn't clear that I was taking one side of the ongoing argument, I apologize. The Wiki article recaps both sides of that ongoing discussion. I feel that the legal underpinnings on Elgin's side are rather shaky.

To wit, he had permission to, apparently, take some samples. He took the whole damned face of the building.

And the issue isn't what he paid for them. He didn't pay for them. He spent a small fortune, though, in removing them and transporting them. The British Museum did not fund Elgin. They bought the marbles outright.

And to be clear on what I'm saying in my Pollyannaish beliefs: Museums should be reimbursed, but intelligent museum managers and trustees are making efforts in many places to repatriate national treasures. They are getting reimbursed. Either a private citizen or an institution is putting up the funds to buy them back at a fair price. I do not think that anyone has the right to say, "Well, your great grand-daddy bought them from a thief, so too bad, I get them back and you have now lost your life's savings (or one of your best attractions).

Note that I'm not saying, for instance, that the Egyptian temple in the Met in New York should be returned. They bought it (actually got it for the cost of its extraction, I think) because the Egyptians were going to cover it with water when the opened the Aswan Dam. Clearly not a case of dubious chain of possession, and clearly not a case of someone jobbing someone else out of a treasure.

[Foolmewunz]

The Indians who lived on the land were paid equivalent of $1,000 of today's currency. It doesn't matter how much your place is worth after changing through hundreds of hands. It's the original 'sale' that is bogus.

That's someone else's argument, not mine. If I see them, I'll ask them to drop in so you can continue dueling with this strawman.



Only because anyone saying 'I want Manhattan back, here's a thousand bucks' is rightly laughed out of court.
Ya think? Or maybe because neither party, for years after the transaction, disputed it or thought they hadn't made a fair deal.



Luckily the world does not revolve around you and your bizarre and patchy personal moral code.
Well, it should. And my moral code is not in the least patchy. (See above. You're arguing a strawman to make it patchy, but I'm not allowing that gambit, so you'll have to throw down something that actually evidences this contention of yours or give it up.)


You're on a skeptics forum, arguing that the museums of the world should just return everything to their 'rightful owners'. The mind boggles.

Does your mind generally boggle that easily? Yes, that's what I'm saying.... "in return for which they will get fair market remuneration". In your strawman army there that you keep next to the computer, I'm sure you have the one that has me saying that they should be forced to do so. Don't bother to trot it out. No where (go on, check,.... I'll wait) do I say that this needs to be done under duress. Several of you are assuming that's what I'm saying, but I have repeatedly said that the current holders should be reimbursed. Not in terms of the original purchase price, but in terms of the value they get from it today, or in the case of a painting or a piece of real estate (as long as you're harping on that red herring) at its currently appraised value.

Gasp! Yes. That's what I'm saying. They need to think the whole thing through and do what's ultimately best and fairest for BOTH sides. I know, it's much more fun to see things in black and white and make one side outrageously evil and the other saintly, but we were talking about the real world.

My solution is not MY solution. It is well thought out and it is practical. And in the long run - the next millenium, say - it'll be the way things are done. It's already happened in at least the Berlin/Egypt dealings, and I think it'll happen more often.

Again with the zany 'once stolen crap has passed through a few legitimate hands and built up paperwork it's A-OK' line of reasoning. Naaah. Didn't say that, did I? I merely said that I'm not talking about those cases as the discussion is entirely different. There's a whole different set of arguments and a whole different bunch of concerns when it comes down to adequately documented chain of custody/ownership. I do NOT support someone coming back after four hundred years and saying that The Tate has to return the ancestor's DaVinci because it's obviously now worth more than great great great great Aunt Tilly thought it was. Repeat: I do NOT support....

[Giz]

I have repeatedly said that the current holders should be reimbursed. Not in terms of the original purchase price, but in terms of the value they get from it today, or in the case of a painting or a piece of real estate (as long as you're harping on that red herring) at its currently appraised value.



So you only get your stolen property returned if you can afford to buy it back from the thief/fence/receiver? In your world we seem to have the worst of everything... current owners have to make amends for their forebears misdeeds (misdeeds when examined with 21st century, not contemporary morality) plus the wronged parties have to buy back their stolen property.

But you're alright, because the Native Americans clearly understood freehold property deeds when they sold that land. (I just hope that the 60 gulders hadn't been raised by looting the spice islands - otherwise perhaps they should own Manhatten!)

[ddt]

So you only get your stolen property returned if you can afford to buy it back from the thief/fence/receiver? In your world we seem to have the worst of everything... current owners have to make amends for their forebears misdeeds (misdeeds when examined with 21st century, not contemporary morality) plus the wronged parties have to buy back their stolen property.
The latter is simply the law. At least, I'm definitely sure it works that way in Holland. Suppose B steals something from A, then B sells it to C, C to D, etc., and it ends up in Z's hands. A can show title, so he's entitled to get it back. Z, however, has bought it in good faith, and must be reimbursed for it - from A. It's the only practical way to deal with such issues, otherwise no-one can be sure of any of his possessions, whether it be antiquities, his house, his car, or whatever. Of course, A can also go after B for getting back the money he had to pay to Z, but well, that's a bit tricky when B is already dead. ;)


But you're alright, because the Native Americans clearly understood freehold property deeds when they sold that land. (I just hope that the 60 gulders hadn't been raised by looting the spice islands - otherwise perhaps they should own Manhatten!)
Peter Minuit was director of the West India Company. So, slave trade is more likely. The African-Americans can complain. :)

[Matthew Best]

Maybe that's how it is in Holland. Here I believe (though I'm sure someone will come along to correct me if I'm wrong) that A would get his property back and Z would get nothing. Z could then claim against Y for selling him stolen goods. Y could then claim against X, and so on back to B. This does seem a lot more convoluted.

[ddt]

Maybe that's how it is in Holland. Here I believe (though I'm sure someone will come along to correct me if I'm wrong) that A would get his property back and Z would get nothing. Z could then claim against Y for selling him stolen goods. Y could then claim against X, and so on back to B. This does seem a lot more convoluted.

That's why I said that (IMHO) it's the only practical solution. I should emphasize, though, that good faith is a requirement. When B is a junkie and sells a perfectly good bike to C for 10 euro, then C should be able to suspect that B didn't obtain the bike in a legal way - and thus, C didn't act in good faith. However, when C then sells the bike for, say, 100 euro to D, and D has no other indication that C might have obtained it illegally, he does act in good faith.

[Foolmewunz]

Oy! The Manhattan real estate discussion really has no bearing, so can we put it to rest? The value of Manhattan, like the value of Hong Kong is not the rocky patch of turf, it's what was built upon it by the later inhabitants and what was done with the space. As a deer hunting and berry gathering ground, it wouldn't be worth the trillions of dollars that it's worth.

When you're talking about artwork and particularly the sort of stuff that fits under "national treasure", you're talking about a whole different issue. You cannot compare land rights disputes to such, fairly. Further, as I mentioned above, in the discussion of museum pieces, you have to separate the categories, too. While you might have certain works of art that might be considered a national treasure, generally paintings and sculpture by known artists are valuable based on that known artist, not the country from which it came.

Archaeological Plunder is a different category. The value of Angkor Wat or The Sphinx or the Elgin Marbles, is not in the name of the architect or sculptor, but in their historic significance and their position on the landscape in those famed locations. The fact that several hundred years ago (or today if it was to happen again) your daddy whupped my daddy really should have no bearing. Unless, of course, we're really going back to wild wild west shoot 'em up decisions for everything.

Ergo, giving a little bit of face to the conquerors and plunderers, I'm assuming that whomever, in the present, has ended up in possession of the various sarcophagi(uses), Chin dynasty drinking cups, temple parts, Peruvian mummies, Incan temple ornaments, etc... has done so legally, by their local standards, and never intended to steal or cheat. And as such, I say that we give them back value for their surrendered objects if they agree to surrender them. And by value, you can include money, cultural exchanges, whatever you want... The flip side to Smith's statement(Adam, not Will) about everything being worth what the purchaser will pay for it, is "and the seller will accept for it".

And, as I said, it is practical, and it is happening in the present. In the last big auction for Chinese rarities, the big bidder was an anonymous Chinese businessman who is, it is said, going to bring the stuff home and give it to one of the national museums. Yet another group of Chinese have made repeated overtures to the Taiwanese to try to get back some of the swag they took when they checked in at Hotel Formosa. No one's saying, "We'll be over with a couple of the boys in the morning, and you'll either have the artifacts returned or we'll break your legs on the curb outside."

But people want their history back. And in places, like London or New York, where that ancient history has now become the backdrop to more recent history, the Londoners or New Yorkers should get something in return for losing what has become in its own way a not-so-national national treasure.

[Jekyll's Guest]

Archaeological Plunder is a different category.

Only because you say it is.

I'm sorry, I know you think you're laying out why things are different, but I see no universal truth in your assertions. It's simply you lecturing on why some things are sacrosanct and other things should be given up whenever anyone with any kind of old claim offers you some cash.

Everything you are arguing is down to your own moral code, and you are picking and choosing what is right or wrong based purely on your personal worldview. You are arguing your very controversial views as if they are fact, and getting exasperated with people for not seeing the inherent 'wisdom'.

Is my above paragraph wrong, or do other people agree with me? Chime in here folks.

[Tatyana]

If you bothered to read what I posted, I asked a question.

To answer my own question, yes I think the Elgin marbles should be returned, particularly as Greece has (or soon will have, I haven't looked it up) a museum which will do them justice.

The British Museum is gorgeous, not as gorgeous as the Louvre, but still gorgeous.
http://www.richard-seaman.com/Travel/UK/London/Highlights/BritishMuseumFront.jpg

http://www.walktalktour.com/~blog/uploaded_images/L4-CP11-British-Museum-interior-775497.JPG

http://photo.net/philg/digiphotos/200102-e10-london/elgin-marbles.half.jpg

[lionking]

You are arguing your very controversial views

Huh? Very controversial? Here's a list of just some of the supporters of the return of the Marbles:

http://www.parthenonuk.com/supporters.php

This only took a few moments. I'm sure I could come up with far more to prove that it is hardly controversial to argue for a return of them.

BTW, you have a different opinion, fair enough. But your arguments are hardly fact, so it would be good if you settled down a bit and stopped acting like your opinion is self-evidently true.

[Darat]

...snip...

What if...the Greeks had cut them up and flogged them off themselves.

...snip...

They certainly had been doing that for centuries, many collectors a hundred or so years ago would buy bits and pieces that had been incorporated in peoples' homes and buildings.

[Darat]

Maybe that's how it is in Holland. Here I believe (though I'm sure someone will come along to correct me if I'm wrong) that A would get his property back and Z would get nothing. Z could then claim against Y for selling him stolen goods. Y could then claim against X, and so on back to B. This does seem a lot more convoluted.

I'm pretty sure in the UK if you've bought stolen goods it is a matter of "buyer beware" and you can even be prosecuted for buying the stolen goods, never mind just losing your money.

[Tatyana]

Huh? Very controversial? Here's a list of just some of the supporters of the return of the Marbles:

http://www.parthenonuk.com/supporters.php

This only took a few moments. I'm sure I could come up with far more to prove that it is hardly controversial to argue for a return of them.

BTW, you have a different opinion, fair enough. But your arguments are hardly fact, so it would be good if you settled down a bit and stopped acting like your opinion is self-evidently true.

Opinion isn't going to make any difference in this discussion.

I really doubt the marbles will ever be returned, it is against the British Museum's charter. Even Nazi-raided art was not returned.

Yes, I know this sort of thing only reinforces the 'ooh, the big bad Empire' that most Americans hold, but as an immigrant to this small, green island, I think it is a good thing.

Any country that will prepare for war by transporting works of art out of all the major galleries to a safe location and protecting those that can't be moved deserves to be the guardians of the great works for all of humanity.

[Tatyana]

I'm pretty sure in the UK if you've bought stolen goods it is a matter of "buyer beware" and you can even be prosecuted for buying the stolen goods, never mind just losing your money.

There is the British Museum Act:




http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2008-09/britishmuseumact1963amendment.html



Summary of the Bill

At present the British Museum is prevented by statute from disposing of objects in its collections except in very limited circumstances. The Bill’s purpose is to amend the British Museum Act 1963 to enable the British Museum to transfer to another institution, for public exhibition, any object from its collections, in certain circumstances, where public access is guaranteed. Those circumstances are:

* where the object would be more widely accessible to visitors than in the British Museum
* where it would be more appropriately displayed in the recipient institution than in the British Museum by reason of its historic links
* where the object came to form part of the collections of the British Museum in circumstances which make its retention in the collections undesirable or inappropriate.

The Bill confers a general power but its sponsor envisages only one situation in which it might realistically apply: to repatriate the Parthenon Marbles to Greece.

[Jekyll's Guest]

BTW, you have a different opinion, fair enough. But your arguments are hardly fact, so it would be good if you settled down a bit and stopped acting like your opinion is self-evidently true.

I direct you to:

The only supportable argument I've seen offered by anyone to the east of complete jingoists...

And, again, for the pillage and plunder fans...

Yup, I'm definitely the one with the problem when it comes to getting excited and stating opinion as self evidently true...

[lionking]

Yes, I know this sort of thing only reinforces the 'ooh, the big bad Empire' that most Americans hold, but as an immigrant to this small, green island, I think it is a good thing.



I'm not an american.

[Jekyll's Guest]

PS: Foolmewunz and Lionking. Although I find the stuff in this thread to be morally simplistic, and comment as such, as far as I'm concerned it starts and ends at this thread.

I have no interest in arbitrarily carrying on grudges to other threads.

:grouphug:

[lionking]

I direct you to:



Yup, I'm definitely the one with the problem when it comes to getting excited and stating opinion as self evidently true...
Firstly, I didn't say you were the only one. This is commonly known as a strawman.

Secondly, partially quoting someone and leaving out the context is commonly known as dishonest.

[lionking]

PS: Foolmewunz and Lionking. Although I find the stuff in this thread to be morally simplistic, and comment as such, as far as I'm concerned it starts and ends at this thread.

I have no interest in arbitrarily carrying on grudges to other threads.

:grouphug:
Same here, and I'm certain it's the same for foolmewunz.

[Jekyll's Guest]

I'm not an american.

You are in an uppity ex colony though, which I believe was the gist :D

Just be glad we didn't steal your...

Um...

Ayers Rock :p

[Jekyll's Guest]

Firstly, I didn't say you were the only one. This is commonly known as a strawman.

Secondly, partially quoting someone and leaving out the context is commonly known as dishonest.

You only directed the critique at me, I can't read minds (No mil for me).

I could have quoted giant blocks of text for no particular reason, but why? Those were the relevant statements about how he views the opposing opinion. There was no "but they may have a point", or "or so the man on the TV said, but I lol'd."

[Damien Evans]

You are in an uppity ex colony though, which I believe was the gist :D

Just be glad we didn't steal your...

Um...

Ayers Rock :p

You did steal a few fossil (and more recent as well) skeletons, which rather pissed off the aboriginals.

[Jekyll's Guest]

You did steal a few fossil (and more recent as well) skeletons, which rather pissed off the aboriginals.

Is archeology stealing?

People leave crap laying in the dirt, of course you assume they don't want it any more.

Oh but dig it up, restore it, put it on display and make money from it, suddenly it's 'heritage.'

They can have anything they dig up in my garden as trade. Fair dinkum.

[richardm]

Just be glad we didn't steal your...

Um...

Ayers Rock :p

Actually there are an awful lot of Aboriginal organisations who are seriously hacked off that museums around the world contain what they consider to be their property (and relatives, or parts thereof).

Edit: I see Damian made that point already, although I'm not sure I'd necessarily characterise it as stealing. As Jekyll says - is archaeology theft?

[Damien Evans]

Is archeology stealing?

People leave crap laying in the dirt, of course you assume they don't want it any more.

Oh but dig it up, restore it, put it on display and make money from it, suddenly it's 'heritage.'

They can have anything they dig up in my garden as trade. Fair dinkum.

According to the Aborigines yes, according to me (studied archaeology for 1 year at uni) no.

[richardm]

People leave crap laying in the dirt, of course you assume they don't want it any more.

I think that in some specific cases the things that were left lying in the dirt were people's relatives, and their relicts weren't too happy about it.

But even in Britain, recent graves have been disturbed in the name of archaeology. For example numerous church crypts have been emptied out in order to turn them into cafeterias. I'm thinking especially of one my old university was called in to work on, where they found out a lot about Victorian burial practices that was previously unknown. But those coffins they were jemmying open weren't more than 150 years old or so, and there were still living relatives. A number of the items found have now made their way into museums; most of the bodies were reburied but some still exist in collections.

So it's not as though it's just 'ignorant wogs' whose graves we despoil and study.

A bit OT, sorry.

Edited to add inverted commas before someone complains ;)

[MikeMangum]

Is archeology stealing?

That all depends. Archeologists are really not all that different from grave robbers, it's just a matter of perspective.

People leave crap laying in the dirt, of course you assume they don't want it any more.

My grandmother was left "laying in the dirt", but I assure you that my family would be very upset if someone dug her up and hauled her away "for science".

[Jekyll's Guest]

My grandmother was left "laying in the dirt", but I assure you that my family would be very upset if someone dug her up and hauled her away "for science".

Give it a couple of thousands years and they just might.

We gawp at mummies in museums, but they always made me feel melancholy. People who put great stock in the sanctity of bodies after death, and they end up stuck in a case with school kids pointing at them.

It's like respect for the dead has a sell by date. Or rather, a don't sell by date.

[Jekyll's Guest]

That all depends. Archeologists are really not all that different from grave robbers, it's just a matter of perspective.

Yet most of us don't call soldiers hired killers, yet that's what they are. They are paid to kill if they are ordered to, but we dress it up with fancy curtains.

Society makes exceptions for practices it considers useful.

[Giz]

Only because you say it is.

I'm sorry, I know you think you're laying out why things are different, but I see no universal truth in your assertions. It's simply you lecturing on why some things are sacrosanct and other things should be given up whenever anyone with any kind of old claim offers you some cash.

Everything you are arguing is down to your own moral code, and you are picking and choosing what is right or wrong based purely on your personal worldview. You are arguing your very controversial views as if they are fact, and getting exasperated with people for not seeing the inherent 'wisdom'.

Is my above paragraph wrong, or do other people agree with me? Chime in here folks.

That's how I see it too.

[Soapy Sam]

The Greeks are welcome (afaic) to come and get the Elgin Marbles.
We've got the Elgin Sandstone. Older and more interesting.
http://www.gla.ac.uk/~gxha14/elgin.html

[Tatyana]

I'm not an american.

It's even worse for the colonies. ;)

Sorry about that, this is an American site, and the greater percentage of the posters are American.