Tuesday, June 06, 2006

Bruce Allen in London: the British Museum


bruce allen in london
Originally uploaded by trudeau.
Allen is head of the art dept. at Centenary College. This is a shot of one of the world's most famous displays: the Elgin Marbles. When the British Empire was at its peak the British purloined a lot of neat stuff. From wikipedia:

The Parthenon Marbles, often called the Elgin Marbles, is a large collection of marble sculptures brought to Britain in 1806 by Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1799-1803. Taking advantange of Ottoman suzerainty over what is now Greece, he obtained a firman for their removal from the Parthenon from the Ottoman Sultan. The sculptures were deposited in the British Museum, London in 1816.

Today the Greeks want all of it back, understandably.

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