I know I’m slightly biased, but ancient Greece really was impressive. And it's probably this majesty that inspired Lord Elgin to hack the Parthenon to bits and take it home. Some people call this piracy, I call it being shrewd.
Nothing pisses me off more than people going on about repatriating the Elgin marbles. I'm Greek Cypriot, so people expect me to fight on the side of Greeks, who are staunchly pro getting them back. However, I'm on the side of the British Museum and think they should stay put. I've entered into a few arguments on social media about this subject because:
1. The British Museum gets 8 million visitors a year (the Acropolis Museum gets over a million)
2. London gets 18 million tourists a year (Athens gets about 2 million and aside from seeing the Acropolis, there's nothing else to do)
3. The British Museum is over an hour away from about 7 of the world's leading universities (Athens has none), circa 20 of the UK's leading universities and I can't be bothered to count the world leading secondary schools in the Home Counties.
4. The British Museum has huge, climate controlled rooms for them (Greeks can barely afford to pay their electricity bills for their homes)
5. Museums from all over the world have dubiously acquired artifacts from antiquity. This isn't unique and it's a neat way of educating people about the wonders of the ancient world. Thus making people less ignorant and arrogant.
2. London gets 18 million tourists a year (Athens gets about 2 million and aside from seeing the Acropolis, there's nothing else to do)
3. The British Museum is over an hour away from about 7 of the world's leading universities (Athens has none), circa 20 of the UK's leading universities and I can't be bothered to count the world leading secondary schools in the Home Counties.
4. The British Museum has huge, climate controlled rooms for them (Greeks can barely afford to pay their electricity bills for their homes)
5. Museums from all over the world have dubiously acquired artifacts from antiquity. This isn't unique and it's a neat way of educating people about the wonders of the ancient world. Thus making people less ignorant and arrogant.
I can hear the shouting now, 'if they were in Greece, our museums would get 8 million visitors'. Sorry buddy, but the only reason people go to Athens is to see the Acropolis. The same number of people would visit the marbles.
Athens is a hole and no one would make a trip specifically to see the marbles. Whereas London is a buzzing metropolis and the British Museum gets the human traffic that came to London for other purposes, ie an event, business, sight-seeing, etc.
It makes me sad that Greece used to be magnificent. It gave the world politics, medicine, science and literature. However, since the fall of Byzantine, the Greeks have given up on life. I'd love to see them go through a third renaissance and become leaders in all things antiquity, intellectual and artistic, but until they sort themselves out financially, this isn't going to happen. And until then, the marbles are staying put.
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First published 01/05/2015
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