LONDON COLLOQUY ON REUNIFICATION OF THE PARTHENON MARBLES LONDON 19 – 20 JUNE 2012

Adv George Bizos SC (A member of Johannesburg Bar and The British Committee for the Reunification Of the Parthenon Marbles) 

A LEGAL AND MORAL ISSUE - WAS A VALID FIRMAN ISSUED?

The Modern Greek state is the successor in title to the territory of Greece that was under control of the Ottoman Empire at the turn of the 19th Century and where the marbles were located prior to their removal by Lord Elgin.  Greece believes that it is legally entitled to the return of the Parthenon Marbles.  Furthermore, it has a clear interest in its cultural heritage, as is reflected in Law 30228 on the Protection of Antiquities and Cultural Heritage in General.  In particular that law makes clear that Greece has a duty, to itself and to its citizens, “to care, within the context of international law, for the protection of cultural objects, which are connected historically with Greece wherever they are located.”  

The marbles that are the subject of this memorandum adorned the Parthenon, on the Acropolis.  They were removed between 1801 and 1810 from the sites at which they were located by Lord Elgin, a Scottish Earl who was at the time the British Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire.  The last of the marbles were finally removed from Greek territory in 1810 and were taken by Lord Elgin back to Britain.

In 1816 Lord Elgin sought to sell the marbles to the British government.  The government, which was interested in making the purchase, conducted a parliamentary enquiry into the question whether Elgin had had permission to remove the marbles.  Having satisfied the majority of the members that Elgin indeed had permission, Parliament resolved to purchase the marbles from Elgin.  In 1816, Parliament passed an Act that vested the ownership of the marbles in the British Museum.  The marbles have been housed there ever since.

As will be seen below, it is the opinion of three of us including Richard Moultrie and Adrian Friedman in the Constitutional Litigation Unit of the Legal Resources Centre in Johannesburg that there may well be a case to be made against the current possessors of the marbles for their return.  In our view, the most effective potential cause of action would be based on the principles of private law and would be litigated by means of an action launched in the English Courts, applying the accepted rules of private international law (conflict of laws).  The strongest arguments are those based on a consideration of, and challenge to, the legality of the original acquisition of the marbles by Lord Elgin.

There is a range of possible causes of action for any claim that might be brought by Greece.  Greece could bring a claim based on its possession at the time at which Elgin removed the marbles.  It could also theoretically bring a claim on the basis that it would presently be the owner of the marbles, had they not have been removed.

It is a well-established principle of private international law that the legality of a transfer of property is to be assessed in terms of the law applicable at the time of the transfer.  Because of the 1816 Act that transferred ownership of the marbles from Elgin to the Trustees of the British Museum, it is important to bear this principle in mind.  If one progresses on the assumption that the Greek claim is one of possession, the predecessors in unlawfully dispossessed Greece (or, more precisely, the predecessors in title of the current Greek state) of the marbles, then the claim must be assessed in terms of the law applicable at the time of the dispossession; i.e., between 1801 and 1810.  The 1816 Act then becomes less significant.  In our view, this approach offers the best prospects of success.  The strongest arguments that we have considered concern the question of whether Elgin truly had permission, and was therefore lawfully entitled, to remove the marbles.  If those arguments are to be advanced, it is important to frame the claim as a possessory action, based on the unlawful removal of the marbles from Greece’s possession.  Our recommendations in this memorandum (a fuller version ahs been published “Colloquium: Protection and Return of Cultural Property, Sakkoula Publications, Athens 2001” ) therefore proceed on the assumption that the best prospect of success involves Greece instituting a claim based on its possession prior to Elgin’s removal of the marbles.

This memorandum is based on an approach in terms of which Greece would seek relief from a British court in terms of the law or England.  England is, of course, the jurisdiction in which the property is located and it therefore the appropriate jurisdiction in which to institute an action.  Our prima facie view is that, in terms of the private international law currently applied in England, the court will be required to apply the law applicable in Greece at the time of the dispossession.  This is also a well-accepted principle.  Indeed, in the recent case of Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran v Barakat Galleries Ltd the parties accepted that the dispute had to be determined according to the law of Iran at the time of the removal of antiquities from that country, “being the lex situs of the antiquities at the time of derivation of such title”.  This case is the most recent example of the application of this essentially trite principle.

While we have considered the factual bases for arguments to the effect that Elgin did not have the right to remove the marbles, we have relied exclusively and uncritically upon the work of Rudenstine and Demetriades in relation to the law applicable in Greece at the time of the marbles’ removal.  A full consideration of the legal framework will be necessary before a claim may proceed.  

THE VALIDITY OF THE “FIRMAN” . Those who argue that the removal by Elgin of the marbles was lawful rely on the issuance, by the Ottoman authorities, of a firman that was presented to the authorities in Athens on 23 July 1801.  It is our view that there are a range of arguments that could potentially be raised that contradict the view that Elgin was authorised, through a firman, to remove the marbles. In short, these arguments are:

• That the document on which Elgin relied was not in fact a firman but was simply a letter setting out the recommendation of the writer.  The letter was purportedly signed by Kaimmakam Seyid, Abdullah Pasha, the Deputy to the Grand Vizier or Yusuf Ziyauddin Pasha (then currently in charge of the Ottoman army fighting the French in Egypt), whereas only the Sultan, according to this argument, could give authority for the removal of items from the Parthenon; and

• That the English document commonly relied upon to support Elgin’s claim was in fact a distorted translation of an Italian translation of the original Ottoman document.  On this argument, the document has even less weight when considering whether it did indeed grant the required authority to remove all or any of the marbles.

We proceed to deal with each in turn.  We begin by setting out, briefly, the argument that the “firman” was not in fact a firman.  It must be emphasised that the Ottoman Empire was a theocracy.  There was no legislative body and the law in force was sharia.  The Sultan alone was authorised to interpret the sharia law to the extent that it was inadequately expressed and to issue decrees to the extent that they were not inconsistent with sharia.  This latter power was expressed in the issuance of firmans.

Therefore, if the Sultan had issued a firman to Elgin authorising him to remove the marbles, there would be strong support for the view that the act of removal was legal (subject to arguments discussed below).  However, a case could be made out that the firman allegedly relied upon was not in fact a firman.

According to Demetriades, whose views are supported by Islamic scholars, a valid firman would have had the following features:

• It would have contained a “tougras”, which was the emblem of the Sultan.  Only the Sultan could issue a firman. • It would have begun with an “invocatio”, an invocation to God.

• It would have been headed with the Sultan’s monogram.

• It would have contained an “inscriptio”, which would have mentioned the officials to whom it was addressed.

• It would have contained various phrases that were contained only in firmans.  For example, the section containing the specific authority to perform the particular act would begin with the phrase “Upon arrival of the great imperial document, let it be known that …..”.

• It would have ended with the date in Arabic set out in full.

• It would never have mentioned the name of the drafter or editor because the document was written in the name of the Sultan alone.

The document upon which Elgin relied to establish his authority (in the House of Commons enquiry in 1816) contained none of these features.  Furthermore, it was signed by Seged Abdullah Kaimacan, which would never have occurred in the case of a real firman, for the reasons given above.

As will be discussed in more detail below, the document upon which most modern historians rely in support of their view that Elgin had permission to remove the marbles was an English translation.  The authenticity of the English document is open to serious doubt.  However, even if one accepts that the English translation is an exact translation of the original document issued by the Ottoman authorities, the evidence would tend to support the view that the document was an official letter, rather than a firman.  Its author was a high-ranking official in the army (specifically, the deputy to the Grand Vizier), who was present in Egypt fighting against the French army.  As a result of the defeat by the British of the French, this letter was addressed to Elgin as a sign of gratitude.  It did not, however, have the force of a law that would have applied to a firman.

There is no reason in principle why this could not be achieved during the course of a trial.  The ultimate prospects of success of this argument (or any of the other fact-based arguments) may only be assessed cogently once proper consultation with the relevant expert witnesses has taken place.

The second argument relating to the firman focuses on the translated document upon which Elgin relied in the hearing before Parliament in 1816.  The argument is as follows:

• There are potentially three documents upon which Elgin’s claim to have received permission to remove the marbles is based.  First, there is the original document that Elgin obtained from the Ottomans in Constantinople in 1801.  It was referred to in the report of the parliamentary committee that investigated Elgin’s claims in 1818.  Secondly, there is a document in Italian that was revealed at the 1816 hearings by Philip Hunt, an assistant of Elgin’s who was present with him in Constantinople.  Hunt claimed that this document was a direct translation of the Ottoman firman and that the translation had been done in Constantinople in July 1801.  Thirdly, there is an English translation that was referred to in the 1816 parliamentary report, but which was in fact derived from Hunt’s Italian document.

• The original document is now lost, and was already lost by the time that parliament conducted its enquiry in 1816.  No copy of this document has ever been found and there is no reference to it in the archives of the Ottoman Empire.

• The circumstances surrounding the Italian document are somewhat suspicious.  At the Parliamentary hearings, Elgin testified first.  He was repeatedly asked whether he had written proof of having been given permission to remove the marbles.  He answered that he had been given written permission but that he had not kept any of the documents given to him.  He made no mention at all of an Italian translation of the original document.  Hunt was called as a witness towards the end of the hearings and made reference, for the first time, to the Italian translation.  Despite the clear incentive that Elgin had to fabricate the existence of an authentic translation of the original document (because he desperately needed to sell the marbles and Parliament was eager to be satisfied that he had received permission to remove them), the Committee accepted at face value the authenticity of the Italian document.

• There are arguments against the notion that the Italian document was fraudulently created by Elgin with the co-operation of Hunt: in the first place, it would not have been necessary for the document to have been rendered in Italian.  Secondly, and more importantly, the document does not seem to authorise the removal by Elgin of the marbles (see below).  If one were to devise a fraudulent document in these circumstances, one would expect to devise a document that is water-tight in giving the permission required.

• However, even if one accepts that the Italian document was not fraudulently created by Hunt or Elgin to satisfy the Parliamentary committee, there are discrepancies between the Italian document (which has been rediscovered relatively recently) and the English translation relied upon the Parliament.  These discrepancies undermine the claim that the Italian document is a translation of a firman giving permission to Elgin to remove the marbles.

• If one believes the account provided in the report by the Parliamentary select committee, Hunt was in possession of an Italian translation of the original firman given in 1801.  An English translation of that Italian document is annexed to the parliamentary report and it is upon the latter that those claiming that Elgin had authority to remove the marbles rely.

• In the English translation of the document, there appears the following sentence: “We therefore have written this Letter to you, and expedited it by Mr Philip Hunt, an English Gentleman, Secretary of the Aforesaid Ambassador”.  In the Italian version of the document, this sentence actually reads as follows: “We therefore have written this Letter to you, and expedited it by N.N.”  It seems that the initials N.N. were used when the name of the person in question was to be inserted later.

• The second discrepancy is as follows: In the English translation, it says at the bottom “Signed (with a signet) Seged Abdullah Kaimacan”.  However, the Italian version of the document is not signed, with a signet or at all, by anyone, let alone Seged Abdullah Kaimacan.

• In the light of the above, it is clear that the Italian document could not have been a translation of a firman.  No final document would have contained the initials N.N. in it, because the identity of the deliverer would have been known to the drafter by the time the draft was finalised.  In addition, there is no explanation for translating the firman into Italian since neither Elgin nor Hunt spoke Italian.

• The most plausible explanation of the nature of the document is that it was a document drafted by Pisani, Elgin’s negotiator and translator, which was to be presented to the authorities.  In other words, it was a document that had been drafted by Elgin’s men in the hope that the authorities would approve its content and issue an official letter based on its text.  However, the evidence seems compelling that the Italian document could not have been a translation of a firman and was not even a final version of a letter.

• In short, the Italian version of the document is clearly not a firman and does not seem even to be a final draft of a letter.  The English version of the document is a final draft, but not of a firman.  Although the evidence seems to support the view that it was the Italian document and not the English document that constitutes an authentic translation of the original Ottoman text, on either version there was no firman granting permission to Elgin to remove the marbles.

THE OTTOMANS HAD NO POWER TO GIVE TITLE IN THE MARBLES. There are a range of arguments that might be advanced that relate to the authority of the Ottomans, or the particular officials that ostensibly gave authority, to permit Elgin to remove the marbles.  A brief synopsis of these arguments is as follows:

• To the extent that permission was indeed given to Elgin, it was given by officials who did not have the authority to give it.  This argument is similar to the argument advanced above in respect of the firman.  In terms of this argument, to the extent that Elgin was indeed authorised to remove the marbles, he was authorised to do so by persons who lacked the requisite authority.

• A similar argument is to the effect that the Ottomans were bribed into giving permission and therefore the authority given was not lawful.  This argument must be approached with caution.  As argued above, it is well-accepted, both in terms of private and public international law, that the legality of the acquisition of title in property must be assessed by the law of the country in which the property is acquired at the time at which it was acquired.  In terms of that approach, the validity of Elgin’s acquisition of the marbles must be assessed according to the law in force in Greece at the time of the acquisition (i.e. between 1801 and 1810).  Those that argue that the bribery of the Ottoman officials renders the permission that they gave nugatory, rely on the fact that, at the time, bribery was already proscribed by the law of England.  While bribery may well have been the norm at the time in Athens, we cannot imagine that it would have actually been legal.  However, the question would still arise whether proof of bribery could render the otherwise valid firman invalid – not to mention the further question that there is no indication in any of the evidence that we have obtained that the firman itself was obtained by bribery, whereas it is quite clear that bribes were regularly paid to the local Athens officials such as the Disdar and Voivode.

• The last of the arguments in regard to the authority of the Ottomans to give Elgin permission is of broader application.  In terms of this argument, the Ottomans’ military occupation of Greece did not give them authority to alienate the marbles.  Once again, this argument should be approached with caution.  It is based on developments in the law of occupation under public international law that have occurred in the 20th Century.  On the assumption that the legality of the transfer must be assessed at the time at which it took place, it is difficult to argue that modern developments in the law of occupation may be applied retrospectively.

• More than one third of the members of the British Parliament voted against the purchase of the marbles. Might the result have been different if the House had not been misled by Elgin and his agents?

In another important case of Autocephalous Greek Orthodox Church of Cyprus v Goldberg and Feldman Fine Arts Inc the laws of Cyprus, Switzerland and Indiana in the United States were considered.  The case is discussed by Professor Symeon Symeonides, Distinguished Professor of Law; Dean Emeritus Willamette University in “Colloquium: Protection and Return of Cultural Property, Sakkoula Publications, Athens 2001”. Although there may be arguments to the contrary the law of the state of origin of the property should prevail.  The law of Cyprus did prevail even though they were removed from the northern part of Cyprus which is occupied by the Turkish military force. 

However, litigation is not our first option.

The Director of the British Museum persists in describing the Parthenon as a ruin.  For the Greeks and philhellenes, despite the damage done to it by the Venetians, the Ottomans and Lord Elgin, it is still a symbol of Athenian Democracy, civilisation and the spirit of Hellenism.  Pericles who declared that “we are lovers of beauty without extravagance” had the Parthenon in mind.  Lord Byron, the most ardent Philhellene, condemned Elgin’s removal of the marbles.

Nadine Gordimer the Nobel Laureate has written in the foreword to Christopher Hitchens’ book “On any criteria of ability, facility to preserve and display their own heritage of great works of art as their importance decrees, Greece has created a claim incontestably unmatched.  The Parthenon Gallery in the New Acropolis Museum provides a sweep of contiguous space for the 106-metre-long Panatheneaic Procession as it never could be seen anywhere else, facing the Parthenon itself high on the Sacred Rock. But there are gaps in their magnificent frieze, left blank. They are there to be filled by an honourable return of the missing parts from the British Museum.  Reverence - and justice - demand this.”

The people of Greece, of the Diaspora and the Philhellenes of the world cannot rest until the Parthenon Marbles are restored to their home.  It would enhance the friendship between the people of Greece and those in the United Kingdom. It would be the right thing to do. 

Adv George Bizos SC (A member of Johannesburg Bar and The British Committee for the Reunification Of the Parthenon Marbles)

Christopher Hitchens tells Christina Borg why the marbles must be returned to Athens

Two weeks ago, at the New Acropolis Museum in Athens, due to open early next year, the Presidents of Italy and Greece took part in an historic ceremony (right) that could have major repercussions for Britain. The Italians were handing back to the Greeks a fragment of marble sculpture taken from the Parthenon 200 years ago. The fragment portrays, in exquisite detail, the draped lower leg and foot of a seated goddess, probably Artemis.

It had been removed by the notorious Lord Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire which was occupying Greece at the time. Elgin gave the fragment to the British Consul-General of Sicily and it ended up in the Salinas Museum in Palermo.

Elgin took the bulk of the sculptures back to London where they have been in the British Museum since 1816. Greece has demanded the return of the so-called 'Elgin marbles' ever since, but to no avail. Now the question is very simple: if the Italians can be magnanimous and give back a treasure that is rightfully the Greeks', why cannot the British follow suit?

While the British Government and the British Museum have constantly prevaricated, the British people - as judged by opinion polls down the years - have felt more relaxed about giving the Elgin marbles back to Greece. One argument British officialdom has constantly used against returning the marbles has been Greece's reported inability to care for its antiquities. But the opening in 2009 of the New Acropolis Museum whose innovative design, the work of Swiss-born architect Bernard Tschumi, offers a sweeping 360-degree view of the Acropolis, surely puts an end to such criticism.

In a Times article dated August 27, the museum was described as "one of the most beautiful exhibition spaces in modern architecture". Eleni Cubitt secretary of the British Committee for the Reunification of the Parthenon Marbles ­ a campaigning body set up in 1983 as a response to Melina Mercouri's appeal for the marbles' repatriation - endorses this view. "The Parthenon Sculptures deserve to be housed in the New Acropolis Museum," she says. "Currently they are a fragmented piece of art, yet as one significant piece, visitors will be able to see the whole as it ought to be seen, in context, at the foot of the Acropolis itself."

Echoing these sentiments is the writer Christopher Hitchens, who earlier this year re-published his 1987 polemic, The Elgin Marbles, now retitled The Parthenon Marbles: The Case for Reunification. Hitchens insists the Greeks have "a natural right" to the sculptures, and that they belong on the hill of the Acropolis - "in that light, in that air. Pentelic marble does not occur in the UK."

So why hasn't this been evident to the British authorities? Hitchens says: "Partly, that is to do with Greece's geography in that for a long time it wasn't a stable country: repeated wars, occupations, demolitions, and so on, in which the temples suffered terribly."

Hitchens's interest in the marbles began about 25 years ago when he read an essay by Colin Macinnes, author of the 1950s novel Absolute Beginners. "He'd taken an interest in the Parthenon Marbles early on when no one was bothering with it and I read his essay and thought 'Shit, I didn't know all that. I didn't know.' I was predisposed to be a philhellene by my education and by making friends with a lot of Greeks during the time of the dictatorship. Who isn't impressed by what they find out about 5th century Athens?

"But the congealing, catalysing effect was this essay and around that time Melina Mercouri[the former actress and singer] became the Greek Minister of Culture and the subject got revived."

Hitchens wrote his first article on the subject for the Spectator in 1983. "The thing that struck me the most and still does was that though my article had taken one-by-one all the arguments for retention and said this is why these arguments that are well known are actually very bogus, people wrote to me as if I had not mentioned them. "And I thought - this is very odd that people should be so blind, I mean I've just said why that's a crap argument... and they write to me and say - 'What about if all museums had to give back all their stuff!' This was a wildly dogmatic, radical position: irrational, unexamined, intolerant and they wouldn't give you credit for having tried to deal with their case in advance.

"And so I thought, right, that means I'm onto something. It certainly means we will win the argument because people on the other side aren't trying to argue, all they're saying is 'Ya, ya, ya, ya, we've got them and you can't make us take them back!'"

Twenty-five years on, however, the argument is still not won, and there remain those who argue that if Lord Elgin hadn't removed the marbles, they'd have been destroyed or lost. And so, they argue, he did the right thing. Hitchens still maintains Elgin had no right to take them and the British should be impelled to return them. "We can't live with this embarrassment." And he's surprised the Greeks aren't ruder about it.

"Even if they say 'Thank you, you rescued our property from the fire next door, you looked after it while our house burnt down, the fire was our fault'... that doesn't mean we own the stuff. You wouldn't put up with anyone saying 'Oh well, yeah, thanks I guess I did look after it - in fact it's mine now.'"

When Mercouri died in 1994, Hitchens was one of those who walked in her funeral cortege. He still feels sad Mercouri didn't live to see the marbles returned - but sadder still that her husband, filmmaker Jules Dassin, died in March this year before he could see the official opening of the New Acropolis Museum. "That was a feasible desire. We - he and I - could've been there."

Hitchens is adamant that the campaign that Mercouri began will never be abandoned. "As Rabbi Hillel the great Babylonian Rabbi said, 'You may not ever see the victory of the justice but you have no right to abandon the struggle for it.'" He likes to imagine the day the marbles are returned: "Here's the day: the day's come, British PM arrives, the ship arrives at Piraeus, the ceremony's begun, there are fireworks... Who can think about that and not want it to happen?"

In June 2009, Chrstopher Hitchens visited the Acropolis Museum and wrote an article for Vanity Fair.

"I was deeply moved during a recent visit to the Acropolis Museum in Athens", writes Alfredo Cafasso Vitale. His article was first published in ekathimerini on Thursday 02 June 2022.

With the kind permission from Alfredo Cafasso Vitale, the remainder of the article can also be read below:

This fragment, which is part of the eastern frieze of the Parthenon, depicts a foot and a part of the peplos of Artemis, and was acquired in 1816 by the British consul in Sicily, Robert Fagan. After his death in 1820, it was sold to the Museum of the Royal University of Palermo and from there it was then passed to the Salinas Museum.

The top floor of the Acropolis Museum is a virtual reconstruction of the Parthenon, and the area has been designed, with its position and glass, to reflect, and to not only display this reconstruction, but to also visually link it to the original near 2,500-year-old structure on the Acropolis hill. The Fagan fragmentis now displayed in a glass case, within its place in the reconstruction and also looking out at the actual historical site.

I hope this trip paves the way for a much more important and long-awaited journey of the marbles from the British Museum, “stolen” in the early 1800s by Thomas Bruce, then made Lord Elgin, ambassador of Great Britain to Constantinople.

During the period of Ottoman occupation in Greece, Elgin apparently obtained the permission of the sultan to remove the marbles. These were then dispersed in different locations (the same Fagan fragment came directly from Elgin). Some marbles were lost at sea, during transport, but most eventually arrived at the British Museum.

This process, which is not, in some quarters, considered to be a valid and genuine method of acquisition, has triggered fierce international debates, and has initiated official requests for restitution of the marbles by various Greek governments.

The Nobel Prize winner Nadine Gordimer, in the preface to the splendid book by Christopher Hitchens, “The Parthenon Marbles,The Case for Reunification” underlined how the presence of the marbles in London represented the stone manifesto of British colonial arrogance, and how much the marbles belonged, representing their DNA in art, to the Greek people.

These sculptures by Phidias have been requested in vain for almost 40 years by various Greek governments (the first was Minister of Culture Melina Mercouri in 1984), and most recently by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in an interview on British television.

It should be noted that, as a student, Boris Johnson wrote, in an article in Oxford, “…it is evident to me, how much [these marbles] are woven into the Greek identity. It would be a wonderful thing if they could be returned.” Latterly, Ed Vaizey, former minister of culture of the Cameron government, recently stated that they should be in Athens.

The National Archaeological Museum of Athens has transferred its 10 fragments of the Parthenon to the Acropolis Museum, strengthening the reunification process and sparking a fresh discussion about the never dormant request for the return of the marbles.

I hope that the exchange program with Sicily will lead the way to a solution for the return of the marbles, which would, in turn, strengthen Greece’s cultural identity, and perhaps help reinforce it politically and economically. The country has been trying with all its strength and succeeding in re-emerging from the profound crisis of the last decade.

In another indication that perhaps the tide is turning in favor of the return of the marbles, the Musee des Civilizations du Quai Branly in Paris and the Berlin Ethnologisches Museum have initiated the return of African artifacts to Nigeria, improperly taken away during the colonial period from Benin City.

As a footnote, upon exiting the museum, I entered the metro, heading home, at the Acropolis station. Going down to the platform, I was greeted by the giant picture of Melina Mercouri in front of the Parthenon, wrapped in an elegant trench coat, a bundle of wild flowers in her hands, and an immense and radiant smile, which today seems even more radiant. The return process, dreamed of and initiated by her, seems to have perhaps gained some momentum.

15 December 2021, artnet

Parthenon Galleries, Room 18 in the Briish Mueum remained closed for 13 months and were reopened this week, on Monday 13 December 2021 

Dan Hicks' Op-Ed article in artnet says it all. Wednesday 15 December 2021 was the 10th anniversary of Christopher Hitchens' death. For those of you that have supported our Committee for nearly four decades and those of you that have joined us recently, the book that Christopher Hitchens wrote, is one to also read. 

Dan Hicks article 'The U.K. Has Held Onto the Parthenon Marbles for Centuries—But the Tide Is Turning' in arnet suggests that change may come by 2030. As we circulated this article to our members, Alex M Benakis emailed a swift response: 'oh please can we do better than 2030! I will be 93! Don't know if I can hang on for that long.'

Dan starts his article by quoting Christopher Hitchens: "those who support the status quo at the British Museum have the great advantage of inertia on their side.” Dan Hicks adds:'Today, things could hardly be more different.' As more museums are considering returing artefacts to their countries of origin. The best example to date are the returns of the Benin Bronzes.

The third edition Christopher Hitchens book 'The Parthenon Marbles, The Case for Reunification' was launched at Chatham House in May 2008 by BCRPM with George Bizos and Christopher Hitchens travelling to London, a year before the opening of the new Acropolis Museum. It is available from Verso, you can follow the link here.

'Now that the Benin Bronzes are being returned by an ever-growing number of European and North American institutions, might we finally see the return of the Parthenon Marbles?' Asks Dan Hicks. He believes so and adds: 'today, the longstanding push-and-pull between Athens and London over the legal technicalities of what constitutes rightful ownership and what museum press-officers prefer to euphemistically call acquisition is being reframed.'

Dan also feels that 'matters came to a head this fall, on September 28, when a resolution about the return of the Marbles came before UNESCO’s Return and Restitution Intergovernmental Committee (ICPRCP). The British rhetoric that the British Museum “is a world museum” sounded tired coming after the elegant claim by professor Nikos Stampolidis, the newly-elected Director-General of the Acropolis Museum, that “the return of the Parthenon Marbles back to Greece is a universal demand.”

The newly elected Director-General of the Acropolis Museum, Professor Nikos Stampolidis in the Parthenon Gallery, Athens, Greece.

'The committee’s concluding decision stated that “the obligation to return the Parthenon Sculptures lies squarely” on the U.K. government and expressed “disappointment” with the U.K.’s position. The group called on the nation “to reconsider its stand and proceed to a bonafide dialog with Greece on the matter.”

This was swiftly followed by Kyriakos Mitsotakis London visit on 16 November 2021 and his eloquent request for reunification made on breakfast TV and at 10 Downing Street, plus the Science Museum. Janet Suzman, BCRPM's Chair wrote: 'Sometimes fairy tales come true: I never thought to see the stunning coverage given to the Parthenon Marbles by two leading right-wing newspapers, The Mail and The Telegraph.' To read her article follow the link here.

Just last week on 08 December 2021, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution (supported by 111 countries) introduced by Greece entitled: “Return or restitution of cultural property to the countries of origin”.

Dan Hicks concludes that 'predictions are always risky, and as an archaeologist I confess that the future is technically not my period of expertise. Nonetheless, in this new cultural, internationalist, and intellectual atmosphere, it’s hard to believe that the Parthenon Marbles won’t have been reunited in Athens by the end of the decade.' To read the full article on arnet, follow the link here.

Dan Hicks is Professor of Contemporary Archaeology at the University of Oxford. His latest book, The Brutish Museums: the Benin Bronzes, Colonial Violence and Cultural Restitution is now out in paperback. Twitter: @ProfDanHicks

www.vanityfair.com

July 2009