Has Rishi lost his marbles?

[Barrymagrec]

Is it worth pissing of a smallish but generally friendly nation just to big himself up to the tory right wing?

Greece denies promising not to raise Parthenon Sculptures on UK visit

No. 10 cancelled a meeting between the UK and Greek PMs after comments to the BBC about the sculptures.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Ginger]

I think we should return the marbles

 

[narabdela]

I think we should return the marbles

Most right-minded people would agree, but Rishi has to appease the Daily Mail readers if he has any hope of winning a General Election.

 

[Enfield boy]

Sunk never fails to miss an opportunity to do the right thing. The Greeks have been asking for their return for ever, the UK has no right to hang on to them, it's pure colonial behaviour. To give them back would be a great gesture if nothing else. I'm sure Starmer would offer the Greek government live Skype video of them to set himself apart from the tories!

 

[Kirk]

First our jobs, now our sculptures.

 

[Tony L]

I haven’t researched the history, but I‘m guessing the marbles were effectively stolen by some entitled Tory or other who just thought “these are mine now” and took them, as entitled Tories have done with so much land, artefacts and people throughout history. As such the oligarch PM is only doing what one would expect of his ilk. It isn’t as if he understands the concept of paying his way.

 

[Bob McC]

Trying to look tough for the party faithful.

 

[twotone]

I haven’t researched the history, but I‘m guessing the marbles were effectively stolen by some entitled Tory or other who just thought “these are mine now” and took them, as entitled Tories have done with so much land, artefacts and people throughout history. As such the oligarch PM is only doing what one would expect of his ilk. It isn’t as if he understands the concept of paying his way.

Oh no not just some tory scumbag, Lord Elgin, he literally ripped the parthenon Frieze from the temple and carted it off back to London.

I've been to the Parthenon, back in 1987, it's absolutely astonishing despite being vandalised by the tory toff and the turks who used it as an arsenal and some of the explosives blew up inside the temple.

"Elgin's procurement of the marbles was supported by some, including Goethe,[21] and censured by others in Britain as vandalism, most famously Lord Byron,[22] who wrote the following lines[23]

Dull is the eye that will not weep to see
Thy walls defaced, thy mouldering shrines removed
By British hands, which it had best behoved
To guard those relics ne'er to be restored.
Curst be the hour when from their isle they roved,
And once again thy hapless bosom gored,
And snatch'd thy shrinking gods to northern climes abhorred!"

Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[matt j]

Whilst ever there are enough flag-waving nonces left voting then they'll hang on to them. Starmer won't do anything different for the same reason, maybe he'll offer subsidised plane tickets for Greeks who want to come and have a look at them.

 

[Barrymagrec]

I haven’t researched the history, but I‘m guessing the marbles were effectively stolen by some entitled Tory or other who just thought “these are mine now” and took them, as entitled Tories have done with so much land, artefacts and people throughout history. As such the oligarch PM is only doing what one would expect of his ilk. It isn’t as if he understands the concept of paying his way.

The history is vague and disputed on whether Lord Elgin had legal permission to remove the marbles but if he did it was from the Ottoman empire rulers of Greece at the time so a bit iffy even then. It was not a universally popular move even at the time, Byron railed against Elgin in his poem Childe Harold`s Pilgrimage in 1812 and other eminent people were also anti.

 

[twotone]

The history is vague and disputed on whether Lord Elgin had legal permission to remove the marbles but if he did it was from the Ottoman empire rulers of Greece at the time so a bit iffy even then. It was not a universally popular move even at the time, Byron railed against Elgin in his poem Childe Harold`s Pilgrimage in 1812 and other eminent people were also anti.

Elgin stated that about the middle of the summer of 1801, he had received a firman from the Sublime Porte which allowed his agents not only to "fix scaffolding round the ancient Temple of the Idols [the Parthenon], and to mould the ornamental sculpture and visible figures thereon in plaster and gypsum," but also "to take away any pieces of stone with old inscriptions or figures thereon".[11] The document exists in an Italian translation made by the British Embassy in Constantinople and now held by the British Museum,[17] but no official copy of it has yet been found in the Turkish government archives from the imperial era.[18] There is debate over the legal status of the document.[19][17]

 

[twotone]

The British, with their usual oh but foreigners pish, said that he, Elgin, saved the frieze cause the Greeks weren't capable of looking after the monument, the fact that it's been on the Acropolis hill for 2500 years and survived mostly intact until Elgin vandalised the temple sort of escaped them.

 

[Barrymagrec]

The British, with their usual of the foreigners pish, said that he, Elgin, saved the frieze cause the Greeks weren't capable of looking after the monument, the fact that it's been on the Acropolis hill for 2500 years and survived mostly intact until Elgin vandalised the temple sort of escaped them.

There are also persistent rumours that the British Museum has damaged some of the marbles in their "safe" keeping by using inappopriate cleaning methods.

 

[twotone]

There are also persistent rumours that the British Museum has damaged some of the marbles in their "safe" keeping by using inappopriate cleaning methods.

That's probably the reason why they've never been returned. I've been in the Acropolis museum in Athens and some of the sculptures are magnificent but seemingly Elgin stole the best ones.

 

[myles]

There are also persistent rumours that the British Museum has damaged some of the marbles in their "safe" keeping by using inappopriate cleaning methods.

This is why I never loan records out.

 

[eisenach]

Whilst waiting for the new populist president in Argentina to recue him by having another pop at Las Malvinas, Rich! has to do the best he can.

 

[Jamie]

With the British Museum's track record, I'm surprised they had not been lost and appeared on Ebay by now...

 

[Bob McC]

Whilst waiting for the new populist president in Argentina to recue him by having another pop at Las Malvinas, Rich! has to do the best he can.

I doubt we could stop them now.

 

[mik_rik]

There are also persistent rumours that the British Museum has damaged some of the marbles in their "safe" keeping by using inappopriate cleaning methods.

The topic came up a few years ago,the excuse given for not returning them was that the Greeks could not be trusted as able to care for them,this was after the B.M had used steel wool ,or similar (Brillo pads ?)to attempt to clean them.

 

[gez]

I'm a bit on the fence about the marbles topic (and in general about similar artifacts). Whilst I hate the fact that England effectively stole something that didn't belong to them, the other side of the coin is that: if all such artifacts only existed in the location of their origin, then it would remove the possibility for so many people to enrich their lives and get a real feel for the history of the ancient civilisations around the world. I don't know about anybody else here, but I can't afford to fly to nepal, greece, egypt and all the other places around the world where the artifacts that currently are in the British museum are from. So I think part of me feels that the whole "we want our stuff back, it belongs to us and only us" narrative is whilst obviously spurred by an obvious injustice, also quite selfish and narrow minded (even nationalistic really - and i'm staunch in my hate of all forms of nationalism).

In summary, surely the world as a whole would be richer if nations learned to share their histories with the people of the world by distributing such artifacts around the world so as many people as possible can enjoy them and thus understan the worlds rich cultures and history in a live way? By hording "it's ours" to themselves I feel nations are only serving their own interests. I'd prefer the world was more giving personally.