Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Antiquities Found on Shipwreck That Carried Elgin Marbles


Too bad the ship sank, but most of the other sculptures Lord Elgin saved from being burnt for lime are in the British Museum:
Lord Elgin collected other Greek antiquities besides the sculptures taken from the Parthenon, finds a new survey at the site of the British ship Mentor, which sank off southern Greece more than 200 years ago carrying marbles from the Acropolis to London. During a two-week search that ended on July 12, Greek Culture Ministry divers explored the wreck of the Mentor, off the island of Kythera and found three ancient handles of Rhodian amphoras and a small stone vessel. The handles date to the 3rd century B.C. and belong to jars made in the island of Rhodes. Two are stamped. The findings confirm the theory that other antiquities besides the Partenon marbles were aboard the ship. The shipwreck has been investigated by underwater archaeologists since 2009 in the hope of finding other Parthenon marbles. The ship was loaded with 16 crates of marble art removed from the Acropolis on behalf of Thomas Bruce, the Scottish Earl of Elgin. En-route to Malta and then the United Kingdom, the ship sank in 1802 during a storm at the entrance of the port of Avlaimona, on the island of Kythera.
For more, see here: 'Antiquities Found on Shipwreck That Carried Elgin Marbles' Discovery

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