Why are the PARTHENON MARBLES so controversial? | History of the Elgin Marbles at the British Museum

Should Britain return the PARTHENON MARBLES to Greece? In this week’s video from History Calling we look at the history of the Elgin Marbles (as they are also called) from antiquity to the present day and ask why are the Parthenon Marbles so controversial and were the Parthenon Marbles stolen or saved?

First though, what are the Parthenon sculptures? Answer; they are a collection of friezes, metopes (meaning sculpted reliefs) and statutes depicting creatures from classical mythology and a long procession of human beings. The history of the Parthenon Marbles dates to the 5th century BC when they were first built as part of the Parthenon temple on the Acropolis in Greece, designed to honour the goddess Athena. Over half the Marbles have since been destroyed due to fires, deliberate destruction and looting and of the half that remain, around 50% are in the British Museum and 50% remain in Greece, with a few fragments in other museums including the Louvre in Paris. The story of how the British Museum acquired its share though is complex and contested and has led many to ask, were the Parthenon Marbles stolen, or saved for posterity?

The Marbles now in England were sent there by Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin in the early 1800s, having been taken from the Parthenon, supposedly with the permission of the Ottoman Empire which was then in control of Greece. They were determined to have been acquired legally by a UK Parliamentary Select Committee and in 1816 the British Museum bought them for £35,000 and put them on display.

By the start of the 1830s Greece had acquired its independence and from the 1980s onwards there have been increasingly loud calls from their government and citizens to return the Marbles to their place of origin, making them highly contested objects. The British Museum has refused these calls, stating that the Marbles were brought to England and to that institution legally and that they are not allowed, under the British Museum Act of 1963 to deaccession any of their holdings except under very rare and limited circumstances, which do not apply in this case. They have suggested loans to a Greek museum, but this solution has been refused as Greek authorities do not recognise British ownership of the artefacts. The debate over this contested history continues.

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LEARN MORE:

Catherine Titi, The Parthenon Marbles and International Law (Springer, 2023). This book is available on Amazon but is very expensive. I recommend getting it through a library instead.

British Museum’s statements on the Parthenon marbles
https://www.britishmuseum.org/about-u...

AND

https://www.britishmuseum.org/about-u...

Report from the Select Committee of the House of Common on the Earl of Elgin’s collection of sculptured marbles …(1816)
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?i...

Parthenon Marbles debate between academics, MPs and actor/presenter Stephen Fry
   • Send them back: The Parthenon Marbles...  

British Museum’s Act (1963)
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/...

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