Meggie Macdonald

In an article by Stephen Moss in the Guardian’s G2 enclosure from June 16th, it is perfectly clear that the debate over the Parthenon or Elgin Marbles is far from over – and just as far from being a clear-cut case of theft, imperialism or identity.

In the nineteenth century, Lord Elgin, with permission from the Ottoman Empire that ruled over a not-yet-unified modern Greece, removed several large sculptures from the Acropolis in Athens that were originally part of the Parthenon.  These sculptures have, since Elgin sold them for £35,000, been on display in the British Museum in London for anyone and everyone to see, free of charge.

In the last decades, the Greek state has been continuously demanding the return of these sculptures, arguing that they are cultural property that were unlawfully removed from their country of origin.  At first, it was relatively simple:  curators of the British Museum suggested that the Greeks were unable to provide proper housing for the sculptures and that, until such a structure was available to safely protect the marbles, Greece would have no hope of getting them back.

In just under a week, Athens will unveil its newly completed New Acropolis Museum, built parallel to the Acropolis itself and with a singular purpose:  to properly house and display those sections of the Acropolis buildings that can no longer remain outside but should still be accessible to the world to see.  Inside, are the Caryatid statues from the Erechtheon and the remnants of the mighty frieze that decorated the exterior wall of the cella among other artifacts associated with the Acropolis.

The British Museum has denied that any overtures were made to the Greek government about permanently returning the Parthenon marbles that they hold to Greece.  In reponse, the New Acropolis Museum will also display plaster molds of those pieces that have not been returned – ‘reunited’ is the word the Greeks use, something that Mr Moss very astutely points out to focus on the attitudes of the situation – to accent what is still missing from the original collection.

In the British Museum, in the rooms immediately before the Parthenon gallery, is a short but accurate history of the marbles from when they were first constructed in the fifth century BC to when they were acquired by the British Museum, and includes a continuing summary of the international debate about their restoration to Greece.

The Brits make for a good argument:  the area known today as Greece was not a stable independent state in 1806 when Lord Elgin was studying the Acropolis.  Indeed, he sought permission to remove some of the sculptures from the only authority available at the time – the Ottomans – and it was granted to him.  When, ten years later, Elgin was short of funds, he sold the pieces to the British Museum where they have been on display to the world, free of charge, ever since.  The British Museum has never denied access to anyone and the marbles have been seen by millions of people since their arrival in London two hundred years ago.

However, the Greeks make a good argument as well:  the marbles are part of a structure that symbolises one of the lasting ideas Ancient Greek thinkers bestowed on the western world:  democracy, and that the permanent separation of the Acropolis’ constituent parts detracts from the original magnificence envisioned by Pericles, one of the heads of the state of Classical Athens.

Both institutions and governments are taking the high road saying that only in their possession will the true value of the Parthenon Marbles be communicated to the world at large, that the culture of Ancient Greece is a culture inherited not just by the modern western world but by the whole of human society.  The marbles represent the pinacle of the Classical Age of philosophy and government and of a culture that was capable of creating such beauty from stone.  But both also argue the selfish side, which has become so painfully obvious in the decades’-long debate because neither side is willing to compromise on any front, moral or practical.

This argument will continue to rage, and most likely without resolution, for decades more.  Until human society can recognise that human culture is pervasive and not the realm of one group over another, the Parthenon Marbles will exemplify our current conception of culture wherever they are.

On the BBC News website today, it was announced that a pit of dismembered skeletons has been discovered during construction work on a relief road near Weymouth in Dorset.  It has been suggested by some, including David Score of the Oxford Archaeology project, that this burial pit – dating from the end of the Iron Age to early Roman times – may contain the remains of those who died during a ‘catastrophic event’.

This announcement sounded rather like a similar report from  May 2008 about another burial pit found in Gloucester that is believed to contain victims of a plague that ravaged the Roman Empire during the reign of Antoninus Pius.  The remains, dated to the second century in a range between AD165-189, seemed to have suffered no trauma.  This led archaeologists to suggest that they were victims of a documented epidemic of small pox that swept across the Roman Empire at this time.

The two pits have the similar characteristic of containing human remains that were thrown in ‘haphazardly’, rather than being buried with care and attention.  Although the two pits differ in approximate date by nearly 150 years, it is noteworthy that Dorset, on the south coast of England and Gloucester, in the southwest near Wales roughly correspond to the vertical limit of the Roman province during this time period.  This is not to say that the Romans had not expanded right to the tip of Lands End in Cornwall, or much further north into Wales and the Midlands, but that reasonably the sphere of secure control, even if only relatively secure or controlled, exited along these two regions.

Were plague victims taken as far away from settlements as possible?  This is likely, since the understanding of disease transmission was not clear in the first two centuries AD.  Were they moved to places that people felt were unlikely to pose risks to other communities?  Were these the remains of soldiers and their families, posted to the far reaches of the southwestern edge of the province who lacked any other expedient burial method?  Could this be evidence of a mass execution of some kind? 

Once more information, specifically DNA testing of the remains to determine if they were Romans or Britons, is available, further exploration of this topic will be possible.  In the meantime, it is interesting to note that two such burial pits have been discovered in the last year in a country where inhumation is difficult in winter weather (unlike other parts of the Roman empire).  It is also interesting to note that these mass burials do not correspond with the cremation of bodies considered much less unusual for the Romans, particularly among the upper classes.  Could all this represent some kind of cultural shift previously undocumented?  Could these burials shed more light on the British influence on Roman cultural practices in the province?

Again, this writer looks forward to the publication of the archaeological efforts and analyses of the sites in Gloucester and Dorset and how they come to be used in scholarship in the coming years.

UPDATE  – June 2009:

In an article recently brought to my attention written by a Medievalist blogger, Jonathan Jarrett, and the online publication of the scholarly article in contention, I felt it was important to draw readers’ attention to the very plain fact that all earlier discussion on this topic was based on press releases rather than the actuall scholarly article itself. 

Mr Jarrett makes fine points about issues concerning the variability of temperature in the historical record, the margin for error being much larger than was originally reported – not by any insidiousness on the part of the academics but rather on the misunderstanding and sensationalist tendencies of the hoi polloi – and the fact that the authors of the article are discussing the fact that fired-clay ceramics absorb moisture and that this can be measured. 

Drs Moira A Wilson, Margaret A Carter, Christopher Hall, William D Hoff, Ceren Ince, Shaun D Savage, Bernard Mckay and Ian M Betts are not suggesting that this dating technique will make all other dating techniques obsolete or that its accuracy can be pinpointed to within the year.  They are publishing work done that confirms that the moisture absorption of water into ceramics can have the potential for archaeological implementation.

A lesson to everyone to respond to the article itself and not the reports about its content alone.

The article itself is, as Mr Jarrett comments, a piece of not inconsiderably scientific detail, however sorely lacking in an example of the basic arithmetic for all us plebs.  However, as I stated in my original post, nowhere do the authors of the article comment on the effectiveness of this technique on glazed and painted pottery fragments which are just as prevalent as the ‘ruder’ varieties.  Considering pottery was the ancient world’s most recycled material, akin to the plastic bags we now feel guilty about throwing out but do nonetheless, I think that there would have been much more value in experimenting with these kinds of pot fragments as well.  True, no new technique can be implemented immediately and yield fantastic results, but a new technique with such a limited scope leaves something to be desired.

It will be interesting to reflect in ten years’ time on the archaeological papers that are published and used the rehydroxylation technique to see just how useful it is to field archaeologists and their lab technicians.