Elgin Marbles

[Huguenot]

I didn't know that intriguing story about Elgin though. Fascinating. :))

[Brendan]

Crona Wrote:

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> What I don?t get is that since replicas will be in

> their places why not return the real ones back?

Me either. I think it is perfectly sensible and proper too. I just think that the whole national pride, they?re ours, no they?re business is pointless.

[Crona]

I am afraid I am not getting into poor and illiterate arguments about national identities because clearly you have issues and narrow points of view. In addition your grasp of history stems from a colonial perspective hence all the weak arguments. Do you vote BNP?

[Huguenot]

I'm guessing the issue with replicas is the same for both parties.

There was a study when researchers asked candidates to wear a brown button cardigan. The speed with which they removed it after they were told it had been worn by Fred West is apparently spectacular.

If they were told it was simply of the same make or design, the candidates were largely indifferent.

There's clearly a superstitious element to authenticity which is at play in the debate.

[Huguenot]

"I am afraid I am not getting into poor and illiterate arguments about national identities because clearly you have issues and narrow points of view. In addition your grasp of history stems from a colonial perspective hence all the weak arguments. Do you vote BNP?"

How very silly Crona. All sort of flouncy and spiteful at the same time. Like a spoilt little girl.

[dulwichmum]

You called?

[Huguenot]

;-)

[Crona]

Thank you!:))

[Santerme]

Crona Wrote:

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> I?ve never heard so many weak arguments and

> especially the one that the Ottoman Empire sold

> ?legally? the marbles.

>

> Very cleverly you are hiding or ?missing? one

> point. Greece was occupied during the exchange.

>

> Lets see the bigger picture. The reason the

> marbles exist (i.e. in pieces) is because the

> Ottoman?s used the Parthenon for storing their

> arsenal which eventually one day blew off thus

> destroying one of the old 7 wonders of the world.

> The same occupying force agreed to give away the

> marbles to Lord Elgin.

>

> ?A the time of the purchase the Ottomans ruled the

> region and carried legal responsibility for the

> ownership and distribution of their resources -

> just as the UK does now for its own resources?

>

> It?s like you are saying to us that since UK and

> US occupy Iraq and Afghanistan at the moment we

> are entitled to their artefacts.

>

> Since when an occupying force adopts the ?legal

> responsibility? of the land and their people? They

> can do whatever they want with them (sell, destroy

> etc) but IMHO they are in a position to act

> legally.

>

> Lord Elgin was trading with an Occupying force

> while Lord Byron helped the Greeks to liberate

> themselves.

>

> ?The Museum has accepted the international

> precedent that so long as ownership is not

> contested, the marbles could be returned on loan

> to Greece indefinitely. This is the same precedent

> that has filled Rome with the relics of it's own

> heritage that have been returned from the four

> corners of the world.?

>

> Replicas will be in their place in British museum

> so people will still have access.

>

> (The point that the big museums agreed to have a

> ?Universal museum? is so obvious it speaks of

> itself)

Interesting debate, after the wars of the century around Alexander the Great, the populations of mainland Greece seem to have gone into a steady decline that lasted for a thousand years.

By around the time of Christ, the depopulation of the old city states was a matter of general comment by those who lived there and of Roman visitors.

It is described in a letter to Cicero.

It is implied in an inscription that Nero had placed on the Parthenon.

Plutarch ascribes the progressive silencing of the Greek oracles to the diminished need for their services.

The great plague of 542 reduced populations right across the Mediterranean world, and would have reduced that of mainland Greece still further.

Long before that, however, the majority of those living there might well have been descended less from the nation of Pericles and Demosthenes than from imported slaves and barbarian invaders.

Certainly, in the two centuries of disorder that followed the great plague, the territory was almost wholly lost to the Byzantine State.

When finally reconquered from the Slavs, it had to be rehellenised from Constantinople.

The linguistic evidence is important here. With the exception of the Tsakonians in the Peloponnese, the modern inhabitants of Greece speak a language clearly descended from that of Byzantium, with no trace of the old regional dialects.

[mockney piers]

In all fairness crona, Huguenot merely presented the prevailing academic argument. For keeping them as a counterweight to the nationalist and apologist positions, neatly summed up by Brendan as both essentially absurdist positions.

The argument that modern nationalism can't then be retroactively applied to two different situaions in the past i think is worthy of consideration, I'm totally at a loss as to why that should make Huguenot a membeb of the BNP?

At risk of being all strawmanny, if Wales or ireland was to claim stonehenge as their cultural birthright stolen from them by the cultural genocide of the Saxons then we wouldn't be so very far off what's actually happening here. Hellenic culture was pretty much endemic to the whole of the eastern meditteranean between the first and the 10th centuries, so where is the line drawn, how many buildings of antiquity around turkey and Syria could rightfully be claimed. For that matter are the Turks, most of whom still genetically descend from the original inhabitants of Anatolia equally have a right to claim the marbles (for gods sake don't tell atila I said that).

I'm inclined to say that if there's a nice place to show them near their original setting then go for it, but I think it's important to spit in the face of modern nattionalism imposing it's narrow and emotional interpretation on the past. Modern greeces cultural identity is of course influenced by ancient Greece, but little more than ours to be honest.

[Atila Reincarnate]

Huguenot Wrote:

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> Erm regarding the real world... yes AfN

>

> A Mori poll in 1998 found only 39% of the British

> public in favour of returning the Elgin Marbles.

> So that'll be a minority then.

>

> Mind you, the general public also believe in

> capital punishment, so they're not particularly to

> be trusted.

>

I've just picked up on your comment and would like to ask an honest question. Are you saying that because the general public believe in capital punishment, and presumably you don't, they can't be trusted because their view doesn't square with your own? So presumably then, any majority view that flies in the face of your beliefs should be viewed with suspicion and even mistrust? I thought majority rule was what modern society was based on, doesn't make it right, but hey ho.

[david_carnell]

Just to briefly address AR's point - if the majority of respondents in a poll thought Sydney was the capital of Australia, would that make it so? Ergo, just because your view may be more commonplace doesn't necessarily make it the correct one.

As for the marbles, I'm with Michael P on page1. They're ours. Mitts off. And the Egyptians can't have any of their stuff back either.

[Atila Reincarnate]

david_carnell Wrote:

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> Just to briefly address AR's point - if the

> majority of respondents in a poll thought Sydney

> was the capital of Australia, would that make it

> so? Ergo, just because your view may be more

> commonplace doesn't necessarily make it the

> correct one.

>

> As for the marbles, I'm with Michael P on page1.

> They're ours. Mitts off. And the Egyptians can't

> have any of their stuff back either.

Frankly that's a rubbish response, and quite frankly childish. My point is that to say that general public can't be trusted, and remember you are one of this number, is very patronising, and reminds me of my old school masters constantly telling us they knew best.

[david_carnell]

Ever heard of tyranny of the majority Atila?

Why is my response childish? Or rubbish? You haven't answered why majority views aren't always correct. For hundreds of years the majority view was the the earth was flat. Those that said it was round were often branded as heretics. It didn't make that majority any less wrong however. Not always. Just sometimes.

It would be good if you could at least acknowledge that. I don't expect you to agree on the issue, and this isn't the place to drag up that argument again (you could PM if you really want to do so properly), but just to admit that being in the majority doesn't always make you right.

[Brendan]

david_carnell Wrote:

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> Just to briefly address AR's point - if the

> majority of respondents in a poll thought Sydney

> was the capital of Australia, would that make it

> so? Ergo, just because your view may be more

> commonplace doesn't necessarily make it the

> correct one.

That argument doesn't hold up David and you know it. There is a difference between a statement of fact and an opinion on the morality and effectiveness of a mooted point.

I?m pretty sure that was established by some guy who would probably have described himself as Athenian.

[david_carnell]

Brendan - morality is not defined simply by the view of the majority either, surely?

[Brendan]

No but unlike Canberra, morality isn't a fact.

[david_carnell]

Canberra? Shit, I thought it was Melbourne!

Look, Brendan, you know what I'm getting at so don't obfuscate with semantics. You know as well as I do the dangers of following the herd mentality that Atila is advocating. Whilst I'm not suggesting there should be some intellectual elite that governs a society's moral compass it is silly to suggest we should have the opposite.

[Atila Reincarnate]

david_carnell Wrote:

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> Canberra? Shit, I thought it was Melbourne!

>

> Look, Brendan, you know what I'm getting at so

> don't obfuscate with semantics. You know as well

> as I do the dangers of following the herd

> mentality that Atila is advocating. Whilst I'm not

> suggesting there should be some intellectual elite

> that governs a society's moral compass it is silly

> to suggest we should have the opposite.

Who said I'm advocating the herd mentality? I'm simply asking why the general publics view can't be trusted if it flies in the face of your or anybody elses view. And I did say, just in case you didn't bother to read my post in full, that while majority rule is what modern society is based on, it doesn't mean the majority view is always right. I just don't like the superior tone of the original posting which seemed to suggest that the rest of shouldn't be allowed a view or an opinion, how dangerous is that? Wasn't there a nasty litlle man called Adolf who used to think like that.

[Brendan]

Oy, oy, oy, *holds hands up* dude don?t drag me into your capital punishment barney, I?m like so Switzerland on that one until someone notices the wood. I was just pointing out the flaw in a particular line of deduction.

Word of the day for obfuscate though.

[david_carnell]

I'm invoking Godwin's Law.

If you're bringing the Third Reich in to support your argument, I'm out.

Let's get back to finding Michael's marbles.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

Whilst I'm not suggesting there should be some intellectual elite that governs a society's moral compass it is silly to suggest we should have the opposite./quote]

Plato would be turning in his grave.

Cat's eye anyone?

[Brendan]

Although I?m open to exploring a line of enquiry in which Australia is only a hypothesis.

[Moos]

Peckhamgatecrasher Wrote:

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> Whilst I'm not suggesting there should be some

> intellectual elite that governs a society's moral

> compass it is silly to suggest we should have the

> opposite./quote]

>

> Plato would be turning in his grave.

>

>

> Cat's eye anyone?

Would he? He would have been astonished at the breadth of the democratic mandate in most modern democracies? Women?! Non-landowners?!

On topic, it is interesting that such a lot of noise is made around these particular marbles, rather than looking at the general topic of art in foreign museums vs art in place of origin. The Getty would have to close without its foreign art, bought mostly from bankrupt post-war Europe.

That said, I think you could make a unique case for the Marbles in that to see the original marbles in a perfectly-preserved museum on the site of their original display would be wonderful. But unlike previous posters I'd like to see and understand the evidence that proper care is to be taken to retain their relatively good state of health. Compare the clear, chiselled features of the B. Mus' creamy-white Caryatid from the Erechtheion with those of her blackened, stumpy sisters in their home museum for a case in point. Or look at the general state of the Akropolis, as the marble perceptibly melts each year under the weight of un-restricted tourism and horrendous pollution.

[Santerme]

I read last year that some Jewish group was considering a claim to the Coliseum in Rome on the grounds that it was built by the Flavian Emperors with the proceeds from the sack of Jerusalem in AD70.