The Parthenon is a former temple on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, that was dedicated to the goddess Athena during the fifth century BC. Its decorative sculptures are considered some of the high points of Greek art, an enduring symbol of Ancient Greece, democracy and Western civilization.
The Elgin Marbles are a collection of sculptures and other parts of the Parthenon removed by agents of Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, while Greece was under Ottoman rule, and sent to Britain. The term Parthenon Marbles or Parthenon Sculptures refers specifically to the sculptures from the Parthenon which are now held in various collections around the world, principally in the British Museum and the Acropolis Museum in Athens. The marbles were made under the supervision of the architect and sculptor Phidias and his assistants in the 5th century BCE, with marble from Mount Pentelikon. The collection on display in the British Museum is in the purpose-built Duveen Gallery. The presence of the Elgin Marbles in the British Museum has been the subject of a longstanding international controversy.
Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin and 11th Earl of Kincardine was a British nobleman, soldier, politician and diplomat, known primarily for the controversial procurement of marble sculptures from the Parthenon in Athens.
Maria Amalia "Melina" Mercouri was a Greek actress, singer, activist, and politician. She came from a political family that was prominent over multiple generations. She received an Academy Award nomination and won a Cannes Film Festival Best Actress Award for her performance in the film Never on Sunday (1960). Mercouri was also nominated for one Tony Award, three Golden Globes and two BAFTA Awards in her acting career. In 1987 she was awarded a special prize in the first edition of the Europe Theatre Prize.
The British Committee for the Reunification of the Parthenon Marbles (BCRPM) is a group of British people who support the return of the Parthenon (Elgin) marbles to Athens, Greece.
Sir Richard Peter Lambert is a British journalist and business executive. He served as director-general of the CBI, chancellor of the University of Warwick, editor of the Financial Times newspaper and chairman of the board of the British Museum.
Eleni Cubitt was a filmmaker born in Greece. Her most recent film was The War That Never Ends in 1991, for which she was the executive producer. Under the name of Eleni Collard she was executive producer for the 1968 Jean-Luc Godard film Sympathy for the Devil.
William George Grieve Forrest, known as George Forrest, was a British classicist and academic. From 1977 to 1992, he was Wykeham Professor of Ancient History at the University of Oxford.
The Acropolis Museum is an archaeological museum focused on the findings of the archaeological site of the Acropolis of Athens. The museum was built to house every artifact found on the rock and on the surrounding slopes, from the Greek Bronze Age to Roman and Byzantine Greece and will in particular also house the sculptures historically known as the "Elgin Marbles" when these are returned to Athens. The Acropolis Museum also lies over the ruins of part of Roman and early Byzantine Athens.
Greek–British relations are foreign relations between Greece and the United Kingdom. Greece and the United Kingdom maintain excellent and cordial bilateral relations and consider each other an ally with the Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, paying an official visit to London in 2021. Greece and the United Kingdom are both members of the United Nations, NATO and the Council of Europe. The United Kingdom is also viewed very favorably in Greece. According to a global opinion poll, 77% of Greeks view the United Kingdom favourably, while only 10% don't. The British have a very positive opinion of Greece as well. 66% of the British view Greece positively, while only 3% view it negatively, making Greece one of the most liked countries in the UK.
Stealing Athena is an historical novel by Karen Essex, which chronicles the journey of the controversial Elgin Marbles or Parthenon Sculptures from their home atop the Acropolis in Athens to the present location, The British Museum. The story is told in dual narratives from the points of view of Mary Nisbet, Countess of Elgin, who assisted her husband, British ambassador Lord Elgin, in removing the marbles, and Aspasia, mistress to Pericles, who witnessed the construction of the Parthenon. Published by Doubleday, June 2008.
The International Association for the Reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures is a campaign group, which joins various organizations around the world whose primary aim is to bring about the reunification of all the surviving Parthenon Sculptures to Athens, Greece.
The Palermo fragment, also known as Fagan slab from the name of the artist and British consul Robert Fagan who owned it, is a 2,500-year-old marble sculpture fragment of the foot and dress of the ancient Greek goddess Artemis.
Ian Dennis Jenkins was a Senior Curator at the British Museum who was an expert on ancient Greece and specialised in ancient Greek sculpture. Jenkins published a number of books and over a hundred articles. He led the British Museum's excavations at Cnidus and was involved in the debate over the ownership of the Elgin Marbles.
Matthew Taylor is an architect and campaigner for the return of the Elgin Marbles from the British Museum to Athens, Greece.
Archaeological looting is the illicit removal of artifacts from an archaeological site. Such looting is the major source of artifacts for the antiquities market. Looting typically involves either the illegal exportation of artifacts from their country of origin or the domestic distribution of looted goods. Looting has been linked to the economic and political stability of the possessing nation, with levels of looting increasing during times of crisis, but it has been known to occur during peacetimes and some looters take part in the practice as a means of income, referred to as subsistence looting. However, looting is also endemic in so-called "archaeological countries" like Italy, Greece, Turkey, Sicily, Cyprus and other areas of the Mediterranean Basin, as well as many areas of Africa, South East Asia and Central and South America, which have a rich heritage of archaeological sites, a large proportion of which are still unknown to formal archaeological science. Many countries have antique looting laws which state that the removal of the cultural object without formal permission is illegal and considered theft. Looting is not only illegal; the practice may also threaten access to cultural heritage. Cultural heritage is knowledge about a heritage that is passed down from generation to generation.
Hartwig Fischer is a German art historian and museum director. Since April 2016, he has been director of the British Museum, the first non-British head of the museum since 1866. From 2012 to 2016, he was director of the Dresden State Art Collections.
The Elgin Marbles is a 2006 book by American archaeologist Dorothy King about the 5th century BCE Classical Greek marble sculptures known as the Elgin Marbles.
The pediments of the Parthenon are the two sets of statues in Pentelic marble originally located as the pedimental sculpture on the east and west facades of the Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens. They were probably made by several artists, including Agoracritos. The master builder was probably Phidias. They were probably lifted into place by 432 BC, having been carved on the ground.
Charalambos Bouras was a major Greek restoration architect, engineer and professor of architectural history. Amongst his most notable contributions are his restoration work on the Acropolis of Athens, in the ancient city of Brauron and on the monastery of Hosios Loukas, as well as his many books and scientific articles.
