Search from the Open University Aspropyrgo 3 Mar 2008

Search from the Open University  Aspropyrgo  3 Mar 2008
March 23 15:34 2015 Print This Article

Works of art which hymns have been written about, masterpieces which have been admired by all mankind, Lord Elgin did not hesitate to desecrate and transfer them from the monument and take them to decorate his mansion in Scotland. While these pieces were being taken down much damage was caused to the pieces as the workers threw them on the ground from the height of 12 meters.

The descriptions and narrations of the two British visitors Edward Donwell and Edward Daniel Clark who were witnesses to the seizure of the sculptures shows the barbaric behaviour of the ‘artists’ of Elgin. The professor and Historian Edward Donwell who had visited Athens twice wrote “I faced the sorrow and humiliation as I witnessed the Parthenon being stripped of its brightest sculptures. Some of these sculptures were thrown to the ground from the height of 12 meters. We turned our faces away as not to witness these profane actions which were destroying the works of high intelligence of Perikles and the performances of the genius Feidias.

The professor Edward Daniel Clark described the scene where the sculptures being taken apart one piece slipped from the hands of the workers and fell smashing into pieces on the marble steps of the Parthenon. “We saw with such sadness the gap that was left from the removal of the fascias.

No matter how much wealth or means the rulers had in their possession it would be impossible to reconstruct the damage. Fancinating is the narration of another British, the famous architect Robert Smirk who was doserving the workers of Lord Elgin vidently and clumsily ripping and taking down the plates of friezes. “I was particularly annoyed when I saw the workers of Elgin tranfer the marbles with crowbars from the walls to remove the plates and friezes”.The stones that fell on the floor of the Parthenon shook the ground with a deep hollow sound which resembled the howl of the hurt soul of the temple.

E.F.