The Parthenon was a temple dedicated to the goddess Athena. It was built on top of a hill called Acropolis. You could see it from all over Athens. Construction began at 447 BC and was completed by 438 BC. This is a remarkably short period of time when one considers the principles of architecture employed, some of which are still unknown to us. Inside the temple there was a huge gold and ivory statue of Athena. Outside the Parthenon, high up on its four walls there was a frieze. This frieze was a series of sculptures that went all the way around the building. These sculptures were not added to the building. The sculptors had actually cut the frieze out of the very stone which formed the walls of the building. Many people think that this frieze is one of the most wonderful works of art ever created. The general artistic supervision of the Akropolis buildings was assigned to Pheidias, a reknown sculptor of the times, who distinguished himself by producing decorations that were unique in magnificence.
The Parthenon remained essentially intact until the 5th century when the temple was transformed into a Christian church. The building survived many earthquakes and natural disasters over hundred and hundreds of years, but could not endure the cruelty and damaging violence of its creator ... man. In 1687 when the Turks occupied Athens and were fighting the Italians, they used the Parthenon as an arsenal storing gunpowder and weapons. The Italian general Francesco Morosini ordered the bombardment of the Parthenon to destroy the arsenal. One of the shells fired by Morosini landed in the Parthenon and all the gunpowder exploded. This did terrible damage to the Parthenon. The roof was blown off and everything inside was destroyed. But, as if by miracle, the frieze survived.
Following this disastrous damage came the Elgin catastrophic event. Elgin was a Scottish Lord who was appointed ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. When he visited Athens, Lord Elgin wanted to find some ancient Greek statues to decorate his mansion in Scotland. Surreptitiously he elected to take the statues of the Parthenon frieze and send them back to England. In order to take the frieze, Elgin had to get workmen to saw the frieze off the building. This sawing process also ended up destroying parts of the building in order to lower the sculptures to the ground. Elgin did an enormous damage to the Parthenon building. When Elgin found himself short of money, he decided to sell the Parthenon Marbles to the British government. Some members of the Parliament thought that Elgin had committed thievery and had done a terrible thing in removing the Parthenon Marbles. However, it was decided to buy the Partenon Marbles from Elgin and display them in the British Museum. And they have stayed there ever since.
In the early 1980s, a famous Greek actress called Melina Mercouri (starred in the movie "Never On Sunday") became Minister of Culture in the Greek government. She began a campaign for the return of the Parthenon Marbles. That campaign is still on, although Melina Mercouri died in 1994.
James C. Stathis
Associate Editor
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