Ian Jenkins (Senior Curator of Antiquities, British Museum) died suddenly last Saturday 28 November 2020.

We disagreed of course on the proper abode of the 'Elgin Marbles', but he was a very great scholar/connoisseur and a good friend over many years, the last of them blighted by Parkinson's, and I am very sad that he is no longer with us.

What not many people will know is that he came from what would once have been called a 'humble', that is a working-class, background: his mother, he told me as we were visiting the Greek section of London's West Norwood cemetery together, had been 'in service'.

He wrote many excellent books and exhibition catalogues, including on the Parthenon sculptures, but my favourite remains ......

More controversially, he convened and edited the proceedings of a conference devoted to the 'cleaning' of those Parthenon Marbles confined in the B.M.

BCRPM's Honorary President Professor Anthony Snodgrass adds: one big thing in Ian Jenkins favour was the honesty of his speech at the 1998 BM Colloquium on the 'cleaning' (his conduct later on notwithstanding), in which he said:"The cleaning was a scandal, and the cover-up another scandal."

Several BCRPM members attended the BM's '200 years of the Elgin Collection lecture' on 01 July 2016 and Ian Jenkins then wrote an article in the September /October 2016 British Archaeology Magazine. This article was written to mark 200 years since the British government's decision in June 1816 to purchase Lord Elgin's collection of Parthenon (and other) Marbles, and which starts off by noting the latest (July 11) Parliamentary bid to have them restored to their native Athens, he provides a most succinct and pointed resume of the current state of play: how they came into Elgin's possession and then the British Museum's custodianship, what they represent, and what pieces of the Parthenon are not in the British Museum (and not in the new Acropolis Museum, either...).

In April 2018, the Rodin exhibition opened at the BM and Greek journalist Labis Tsirigotakis interviewed Ian Jenkins for ERT, Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation TV. The questions regarding the Parthenon sculptures put to Ian by Labis were firm, and the replies equally so. 

A recent, revealing interview with him was published in The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies' ARGO magazine.

Rest in peace.

Paul Cartledge

A.G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture Emeritus
University of Cambridge

Stephen Fry first wrote a wonderful 'Modest Proposal' in support of the reunification of the Parthenon Marbles. This came after the campaign lost Christopher Hitchens to cancer.

The ties between Christopher Hitchens and our Committee stretch over considerable time and culminated in the third edition of his book ‘The Parthenon Marbles: A Case for Reunification’. This is available from Verso as a paperback or an ebook, the latter was launched on the 07 June 2016 at the Parthenon Marbles Bicentenary Commemorative Event held at Senate House. This edition was dedicated to James Cubitt and has a preface that Nadine Gordimer wrote.

Stephen Fry begins his proposal with these words:"I have a modest proposal that might simultaneously celebrate the life of Christopher Hitchens, strengthen Britain’s low stock in Europe and allow us to help a dear friend in terrible trouble."

Perhaps the most beautiful and famous monument in the world is the Doric masterpiece atop the citadel, or Acropolis, of Athens. It is called the Parthenon, the Virgin Temple dedicated to Pallas Athene, the goddess of wisdom who gave the Greek capital its name."

To read Stephen Fry's 'Modest Proposal' in full, follow the link here. 

Post writing this  proposal, Stephen took part in the Intelligence Squared debate: 'Send them back: The Parthenon Marbles should be returned to Athens', which was won 384 for to 125 against. Then in April 2013 at the invitation by the then Minister of Tourism, Olga Kefalogianni, Stephen visited Athens, the Acropolis and Benaki Museums. He went on to Delphi, Ancient Olympia and Messini. To read more on this trip, kindly visit the Greek Tourism Organisations web site here. 

On 04 November the Metro carried the story of Stephen asking the UK once again to ‘stand on right side of history’ and return the Parthenon Marbles from the British Museum to the Acropolis Museum in Greece. More on this Metro article by Mel Evans here.

There are a few points to raise on the article in the Metro including the fact that the Greek government's request first started after Greece gained independence and susequent requests culminated in the 1980's when iconic Melina Mercouri visited London and made her appeal to then British Museum Director, Sir David Wilson. The aricle refers to the 'Elgin Metopes' but this ought to read 'Marbles' or sculptures as the metpes are but one set of sculptures removed from the Parthenon by Lord Elgin.

At the time that Melina came to visit the British Museum as Minister of Culture for Greece, two Committees were campaigning, the first is that of Emanuel Comino in Australia, which was founded in 1979 and BCRPM in the UK, which was founded in 1983.

Stephen Fry tweeted to his followers to support  the petition set up by John Lefas of Lefas Humanitas and the campaign 'Lost My Marbles'. Mr Lefas funded Geoffrey Robertson's book 'Who Own History' and has launched a web site to complement this new campaign, alongside a petition asking the UK Government  to respond to global calls for artefacts to be returned to their place of origin. Mr Lefas is looking to use the petition to change the British Museum Act of 1963. 

BCRPM members John Tasioulis and Edith Hall were on the panel discussion at King's College with Geoffrey Robertson earlier this year to analyse 'Who owns history?' and you can read about that event here. Professor John Tasioulas' paper covered key points in international law as he also made his own strong arguments to reunite the Parthenon Marbles on moral grounds.

In concluding, Professor Tasioulas said that "the key to the return of the Parthenon marbles is the recognition that the UK stands to gain a tremendous amount by relinquishing them. But to achieve those gains – the gains of acting and being seen to act in accordance with one’s deepest values – it must give them up freely, generously, and in the spirit of friendship, not one darkened by the shadow of legal obligation."

02 November 2020, Janet Suzman in conversation with Yannis Andritsopoulos of Ta Nea

This is sad news indeed, wonderful charismatic handsome Connery - gone. But happily the mischievous gleam in his eye is immortalised on film for posterity to sigh over.

Alas, I never worked with him but admired him from the stalls just like the rest of the world. The legendary Sean fashioned an image of the not-to-be-messed-with British gentleman that far exceeded the reality, if indeed there ever existed such an exotic creature; there is certainly no sighting of the species at the present time.

Nineteen years have passed and the British government remains as obdurate as ever it was, nor the hint of a gentlemanly feeling to be spied amongst the Trustees of the British Museum which still keeps the Marbles captive.

For that is basically all it would take to have those Marbles returned; a sense of fair play and decency to override the tatters of empire and colonialism which hangs about the place.

No matter Acts of Parliament and de-accessions and all the superfluous commentary which obscures the basic argument; the Parthenon Marbles belong where they started, in Athens.

To the dishevelled apparatchiks of empire, Sean would surely murmur in his inimitable Scottish burr: “Give those shtatues back or you might like ataste of thish” - bang-bang. Lights of empire out.

Sean Connery had added his voice to the campaign in 2001. He was visiting Athens for the first time and discussed the issue with the then Greek Culture Minister Evangelos Venizelos.

He told Venizelos he was "confident that the British government will change its position" and the minister thanked Connery for his efforts on the matter.

Sean Connery visited the sacred rock of  the Acropolis to view the Parthenon with Jules Dassin and Vangelis Papathanassiou. He also spoke to journalists about the importance of the return of the Marbles to their homeland. "They had them for two centuries," Connery said referring to the British government "and should return them." 

You can read more on Sean Connery's 2001 historic visit to Athens and the Acropolis, here. 

For more quotes from supporters, kindly visit our 'Supporters' page here.

Today, 18 October 2020, is an extra special day as it marks the 100th birthday of a visionary actress, activist, campaigner and Minister of Culture for Greece, Melina Mercouri. And although she passed away in 1994, the iconic Melina inspired the world, so much so that Greece's Ministry of Culture declared 2020 as the Melina Mercouri year. To this day we continue to reflect on her tireless campaign to reunite the Parthenon Marbles with special thanks and gratitude to Victoria Solomonidis.

Victoria Solomonidis pictured here in the Houses of Parliament with the late Eddie O'Hara

From 1995 until her retirement in 2015, Victoria Solomonidis was a Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Specialist Consultant on Cultural Affairs, with the rank of Minister Counsellor, serving at the Greek Embassy in London.  The issue of the Parthenon Sculptures was high on her agenda: she worked in close association with the British Committee for the Reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures from its inception in 1983 and actively promoted in the UK all aspects connected with the design, building and completion of the New Acropolis Museum. In 2015 she joined the Governing Body of the Melina Mercouri Foundation. 

Victoria agreed in 2016 at the request of our then Chair Eddie O'Hara, to present Melina Mrcouri and the campaign for the reunification of the surviving sculptures from the Parthenon, the 200 Commemorative Event held at Senate House.

The presentation had the audience glued to Victoria's words. The final slide was a short clip, a video, which we have added across all our social media platforms: facebook, twitter and Instagram. Do watch it here too. Melina's words are as pertinent today as they were then, the campaign will go on until the day that the sculptures currently in the British Museum are reunited with their surviving halves in the Acropolis Museum.  

Photo from the archives of Victoria Solomonidis. From left to right: Melina Mercouri (Minister of Culture for Greece), Eleni Cubitt (founder of BCRPM), Graham Binns (the then Chair of BCRPM) in the British Museum's Duveen Gallery June 1986

In 1986 Melina made her memorable speech at Oxford Union, when PM Boris Johnson was then President of the Oxford Union. Melina's speech concluded with these timeless words: “We say to the British government: you have kept those sculptures for almost two centuries. You have cared for them as well as you could, for which we thank you. But now in the name of fairness and morality, please give them back. I sincerely believe that such a gesture from Great Britain would ever honour your name.”

Melina Mercouri, the then Minister of Culture for Greece in conversation with Boris Johnson the then President of the Oxford Union, 1986.

Melina Mercouri sadly passed away in 1994 and did not have the chance to see the superlative Acropolis Museum. Nor marvel at the superb display of the peerless sculptures from the Parthenon in the Parthenon Gallery or the uninterrupted views to the Acropolis and the Parthenon.

Janet Suzman's obsevations on  the campaign in February 2019 included the article  published by Yannis Andristsopoulos in Greek on Saturday 09 February 2019, in Ta Nea, Greece's daily newspaper. It was also re-printed in Parikiaki, a Greek Cypriot London community paper. At the start of this article Janet mentions Melina's impact:

"Melina Mercouri came whirling into Britain many years ago like a mighty wind, to stir up the clouds of dead leaves that often litter the venerable institutions of this land. She demanded the return of the marbles. She is long gone, but the wind still blows, sometimes stronger, sometimes just a breeze to disturb the quiet. Those winds have started up again." To read  Janet Suzman's statement in its entirety, please follow the link here.

"Melina was an actress, I am an actress; that probably means we are basically open-minded. Acting requires you to be non-judgemental about a character and thus to depict its point of view, often very far from your own in real life, as truthfully as possible. I am no scholar, no academic. My position on the BCRPM Committee is one of a perfectly ordinary museum visitor and as such I can see so clearly that the marbles are in the wrong room. They need the sweet Attic sunlight shining on them and a blue sky beyond; they ask to be re-connected to their other half in the New Acropolis Museum where a space for them awaits. They need to be seen in sight of the Parthenon itself, which still astonishingly stands, in full view of that space, so that I, the visitor could turn my head and exclaim “Now I see - that’s where they came from!” No more gloomy light, no more orphaned statuary. They need to be re-joined to their other pedimental half which sits in this fine museum so that I, the visitor, can understand the whole silent conversation between them." Janet Suzman, 2020

With thanks also to Viola Nilsson from SverigeSRadio for her time to interview BCRPM and the Swedish Committee on Melina Mercouri, you can hear the programme 'Stil' dedicated to Melina by following the link here.

 Melina Mercouri – Greece's brightest star and greatest ambassador..... Actress and politician Melina Mercouri put Greece on a whole new map through her passionate commitment to both culture and politics. This year, 2020, she would have turned 100.

Homer's Odyssey is one of the world’s most influential poems.

Janet Suzman*, our Chair will be starting the journey by reading the opening 95 lines before handing the story over to the next reader. Translated by Emily Wilson and directed by Tom Littler, on Friday 09 October 2020, the voices of 72 actors will recite this version of the Odyssey. Together with the London Review Bookshop and publishers WW Norton, Jermyn Street Theatre will stream this continuous performance of all 24 books live online.

Books 1 to 4 will stream from 9am on the LRB Bookshop YouTube channel,

Books 5 to 24 will continue at 12 noon on the Jermyn Street Theatre YouTube channel and run until late that night.

The entire reading will remain on YouTube for a week (09 October - 16 October 2020).

Emily Wilson is a 2020 Booker Prize Judge and professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Her translation, recapturing the life of the poetry for the 21st century, was hailed as a definitive new version upon its publication in 2017. 

Charlotte Higgins for the Guardian on Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey wrote: “This translation will change the way the poem is read in English. Emily Wilson’s crisp and musical version is a cultural landmark.”

 BCRPM member, Edith Hall wrote in the Daily Telegraph: “In the history of Odyssey translations, few have exerted such a cultural influence that they become ‘classics’ in their own right…I predict that Emily Wilson will win a place in this roll-call of the most significant translations of the poem in history. She certainly deserves the honour”.

*The full cast of actors reciting the Odyssey on 09 October 2020 comprises:
Janet Suzman, Emma Fielding, Jim Findley, Aaron-Louis Cadogan, Dorothea Myer-Bennett, Theo Ancient, Daphne Alexander, Jack Klaff, Sally Cheng, Naomi Frederick, Burt Caesar, Richard Keightley, Jamael Westman, Miranda Foster, Michael Pennington, Bu Kunene, Bea Svistunenko, Joelle Brabban, Christopher Ravenscroft, Michael Lumsden, Naomi Asaturyan, Richard Derrington, Kirsty Bushell, Rob Heanley, Hannah Kumari, Paddy Stafford, Mercedes Assad, Cindy-Jane Armbruster, Augustina Seymour, Stanton Wright, Lynn Farleigh, Simon Kane, Skye Hallam, Lara Sawalha, Elliot Pritchard, Lydia Bakelmun, Edmund Digby-Jones, Waj Ali, Hannah Morrish, Nalan Burgess, Ellie Nunn, Alice McCarthy, Adam Karim, Helen Reuben, Gavin Fowler, Rebecca Banatvala, Viss Elliot Safavi, Leah Whitaker, Adam Sopp, Judy Rosenblatt, Emanuel Vuso, Jessie Bedrossian, Annabel Bates, Tiwalade Ibirogba-Olulode, Atilla Akinci, Sam Crerar, David Sturzaker, Paula James, Issy Van Randwyck, Ian Hallard, Asha Kingsley, Miranda Raison, Samuel Blenkin, David Threlfall and Rachel Pickup.

Emily Wilson's translaton of Homer's Odyssey was published by Norton in hardback in 2017 and paperback in 2018. This year, 2020, Norton's Critical Edition has been published, more on that here.

UK's Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Oliver Dowden has written to museums and galleries (22 September 2020):'The significant support that you receive from the taxpayer is an acknowledgement of the important cultural role you play for the entire country.' He urged institutions to 'continue to act impartially', something he described as 'especially important' as the Government conducts its Comprehensive Spending Review - an apparent threat that funding could be at risk. 

The British Museum said in a statement: 'The British Museum has no intention of removing controversial objects from public display. 'Instead, it will seek where appropriate to contextualise or reinterpret them in a way that enables the public to learn about them in their entirety.'

Mr Dowden's letter, seen by the Telegraph, comes after a summer of cultural clashes over Britain's colonial past. The letter sent to museums and galleries  including the British Museum, Tate galleries, Imperial War museums, National Portrait Gallery, National Museums Liverpool, the Royal Armouries, the Science Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the British Library.

Mr Dowden said in the letter: 'The Government does not support the removal of statues or other similar objects.' 

'Historic England, as the Government's adviser on the historic environment, have said that removing difficult and contentious parts of it risks harming our understanding of our collective past.'

The letter continued: 'As publicly funded bodies, you should not be taking actions motivated by activism or politics.'

• This smacks of disingenuousness. Or even a sort of cultural bribery. Any object in a ‘universal museum’ is a political acquisition, activated by the then colonial power - namely Britain. For 'activism' read looted or just taken. Britain took artefacts just because it could, not with malign intent perhaps but more out of consuming interest and curiosity. However, the cultural importance to the country from which objects were abducted was of no interest to to the colonialists. The British Empire is no more and times have changed and a certain respect for other countries’ history must now enter the museum equation. Our understanding of Britain’s past would be hugely enhanced were Elgin’s stolen Marbles returned to their rightful place in Greece.

The British Museum's most controversial artefacts , the Elgin Marbles are a collection of classical Greek marble sculptures, inscriptions and architectural members that were mostly created by Phidias and his assistants.

• These only became ‘a collection' when they were 'collected’ by Lord Elgin. FACT: these figures and bas reliefs were carved into the Pentelic marble blocks of which the Parthenon was constructed, and were thus part and parcel of the architectural structure of the building itself. Phidias built the Parthenon for Periclean Athens to celebrate the goddess Athena - an historic rite which remains a mystery to modern Britons, even though the beauty of the sculptures as idealised human beings is unmistakeable.

The 7th Earl of Elgin, Thomas Bruce, removed the Parthenon Marble pieces from the Acropolis in Athens while serving as the British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1799 to 1803.

FACT: in so doing he destroyed many parts of the building no thanks to the crude methods his people used to detach the figures from their places, catastrophically damaging the structure of this architectural masterpiece.

In 1801, the Earl claimed to have obtained a permit from the Ottoman authorities to remove pieces from the Parthenon.

FACT: His claim has never been substantiated and thus far not a shred of evidence has been found to support Elgin’s claim.

As the Acropolis was still an Ottoman military fort, Elgin required permission to enter the site.

FACT: ostensibly for a few pieces already fallen to the ground, ('qualche pezzi’ in the Italian of the one and only extant permission) but NOT to hack them off the structure.

His agents subsequently removed half of the surviving sculptures, as well as architectural members and sculpture from the Propylaea and Erechtheum.

FACT: no proof of any permission to do so has ever been found.

The excavation and removal was completed in 1812 at a personal cost of around £70,000

FACT: His ‘personal costs’ included large amounts given as bribes to Ottoman functionaries, often no doubt to turn a blind eye to his depredations. Most of his bribes are carefully recorded.

The sculptures were shipped to Britain at the expense of the British Crown in a naval ship but in Greece, the Scots aristocrat was accused of looting and vandalism.

FACT: rightly so. Elgin had no intention of displaying his collection to the public but intended them solely for his Scottish seat and his own enjoyment. Only when he later went bankrupt was he forced to sell them.

They were bought by the British Government in 1816 and placed in the British Museum.

FACT: They were bought for £35,000 to be placed under the protection of the Trustees, who still hold them in Trust. Trustees cannot own, they can only hold in Trust. And they could decide to cease doing so by returning the Marbles. Good sense and decency demands it.

They still stand on view in the purpose-built Duveen Gallery.

FACT: They have been there for more than 200 years. Isn’t that long enough?

FACT: The visitor is not told the full story: that these pedimental figures are separated from the other half of that pediment in Athens; that most of the frieze - which once galloped right round the building depicting the pan-Atheniac procession - have been so crudely split that the front hooves of a horse, say, can be seen in Britain and the back half in Athens. These are senseless and crude divisions which deprive visitors in Britain and in Greece of seeing the completed work of sculptural art.

Greece has sought their return from the British Museum through the years, to no avail.

The British Minister for Culture has recently stated: “[the British Museum] will seek where appropriate to contextualise or reinterpret them (the artifact) in a way that enables the public to learn about them in their entirety.”

FACT: The BM offers no information for the public to learn the full history of the Marbles 'in their entirety’. They are displayed out of context and the manner of their acquisition is not openly and fully recounted, so how is the public to learn that the building from which they were so crudely torn still stands above Athens for all to see? How are they to know Elgin had no official permission to take them? This makes these pieces unique, because no other building from the ancient world has boasted such transcendent carving as an integral part of it and yet still stands in the 21st Century.

The authenticity of Elgin's permit to remove the sculptures from the Parthenon has been widely disputed, especially as the original document has been lost. Many claim it was not legal.

FACT: This is of prime importance in the dispute: there is no indication that the original document ever existed, let alone that it was ‘legal.'

However, others argue that since the Ottomans had controlled Athens since 1460, their claims to the artefacts were legal and recognisable.

FACT: This is a weak argument that falls under the heading of mere Opinion. Independent Greece does not recognise these claims. Furthermore, the Marbles mark the highest expression of its culture at its height - the remarkable civilisation that was to Hellenise the Western world. The Ottoman occupying powers had no interest in preserving such an alien culture and used the Parthenon merely as an armoury. It was blown up by a Venetian attack on Athens, gravely ruining some of the building. Elgin did the rest.

When the Greeks fought for their independence the so-called legality of Ottoman rule came to an end, and so surely must the legality of the sculptures being held by the BM. Is there such a thing as ‘perpetuity’? For 200 years The British Museum may indeed have protected them from any further depredations by unwelcome visitors or weather, they have duly fed the Enlightenment flame, inspired classical research and artistic inspiration - but now their job is done. They stand at the very heart of Greek national pride and must be returned home to the stunning modern museum - The New Acropolis Museum - built in plain sight of the Parthenon itself. Next year the Greeks celebrate their 200th year of independence from Ottoman rule and crave for their Marbles to be celebrated with them. THEY MUST GO BACK WHERE THEY BELONG.

Janet Suzman, Chair of BCRPM

More on this story in the Daily Mail and  GTP - in the latter the article concludes on this note: Greece has officially requested the temporary return of the Parthenon Marbles to Athens, for the bicentennial events.