Lord Elgin and the Marbles

'The British say they have saved the Marbles. Well, thank you very much. Now give them back.' Melina Mercouri, actress and politician Ever since the sculptures from the Parthenon arrived in England at the beginning of the last century, they have caused controversy. Based on a detailed study of both original records and recent discoveries, Lord Elgin and the Marbles is the authoritative historical account of the extraordinarycircumstances in which the Elgin Marbles were acquired, of the tremendous impact which they made on modern appreciation of Greek art, and of the bitter reaction of Napoleon, Byron, and many others to their appropriation. In the last chapters of this book, William St. Clair now adds further fuel to the controversy by revealing for the first time some disturbing details about the treatment of the Marbles while in the British Museum's care, and of the British Museum's response to public concerns about this importantcultural artefact.

William St. Clair is the author of That Greece Might Still be Free, awarded the Heinemann prize by the Royal Society of Literature. He is also a leading scholar of Byron and Shelley and was awarded the Time Life prize and Macmillan silver pen for his The Godwins and the Shelleys in 1989. He is a contributor to the Financial Times, TLS and other journals, and a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford.