Focus on Elgin Marbles and discuss the Legality of the removal from Athens.
In February 1816, a House of Commons Select Committee held public hearings on whether Elgin had acquired the marbles legally and whether they should be purchased by the government. In his evidence to the committee, Elgin stated that the work of his agents at the Acropolis and the removal of the marbles were authorised by a firman (official edict) from the Sultan obtained in July 1801, and was undertaken with the approval of the voivode (civil governor of Athens) and the dizdar (military commander of the Acropolis citadel). In March 1810, another firman was obtained, authorising the second shipment of marbles from Athens to Britain. Elgin told the committee, "the thing was done publicly before the whole world ... and all the local authorities were concerned in it, as well as the Turkish government".The committee cleared Elgin of all allegations that he had acquired the marbles illegally or had misused his powers as ambassador. Elgin's version of events, however, remains controversial. No official record of the July 1801 firman has been found in the Turkish archives. An Italian translation of the purported firman is held by the British Museum, and an English translation was submitted to the 1816 Select Committee. The document states in part,
that it be written and ordered that the said painters [Elgin's men] while they are occupied in entering and leaving by the gate of the Castle of the City, which is the place for their observations, in setting up scaffolding round the ancient temple of the Idols [the Parthenon], and taking moulds in lime paste (that is plaster) of the same ornaments, and visible figures, in measuring the remains of other ruined buildings, and in undertaking to excavate, according to need, the foundations to find any inscribed blocks, which may have been preserved in the rubble, be not disturbed, nor in any way impeded by the Commandant of the Castle, nor any other person, and that no one meddle with their scaffolding, and implements, which they may have made there; and should they wish to take away any pieces of stone with old inscriptions, and figures, that no opposition be made.
Vassilis Demetriades, of the University of Crete, argues that the document is not a firman (a decree from the Sultan), or a buyuruldi (an order from the Grand Vizier) but a mektub (letter) from the Sultan's acting Grand Vizier which did not have the force of law. Dyfri Williams states that although the document is not a firman in the technical sense, the term was widely used informally in diplomatic and court circles to refer to a range of official Ottoman documents. He argues that the document is possibly a buyuruldi, but "[w]hatever the exact form of the document was, it clearly had to be obeyed, and it was."
There is debate over whether the document authorised Elgin's agents to remove sculptures attached to the Parthenon and other structures. Demetriades, Rudenstine and others argue that the document only authorised Elgin's party to remove artefacts recovered from the permitted excavations, not those still attached to buildings. Williams argues that the document was "rather open ended" and that the civil governor agreed with Hunt's interpretation that it allowed Elgin's party to remove sculptures fixed to buildings. Beard concludes, "No amount of poring over the text can provide the answer. As often with documents sent out from head office, the precise interpretation would rest with men carrying out the orders on the spot."Legal academic John Merryman argues that the document provides only "slender authority" for the removal of the fixed sculptures, but that legally Elgin's actions were ratified by the conduct of Ottoman officials. In 1802, Ottoman officials in Constantinople issued documents to the civil governor and the military commander of Athens ratifying their conduct and, in March 1810, issued a command allowing Elgin to transport a shipment of marbles from Greece to Britain.Rudenstine, in reply, states that no official copies of these documents have been found, we only have the evidence of Elgin's agents and the British Embassy regarding their contents, and therefore we can reach no conclusion regarding the extent to which they ratified Elgin's actions.A number of eyewitnesses to the removal of the marbles from the Acropolis, including members of Elgin's party, stated that expensive bribes and gifts to local officials were required to ensure the work progressed. Merryman argues that the bribery did not make the acquisition of the marbles illegal by the standards of the time. "The Ottomans who were bribed were the responsible officials. Whatever their motivation may have been, they had the legal authority to perform those actions. At a time and in a culture in which officials routinely had to be bribed to perform their legal duties (as is still true today in much of the world), the fact that bribes occurred was hardly a significant legal consideration."Rudenstine, however, states that further investigation would be required to determine whether, at the time, bribery would have been a significant legal consideration in such official transactions under Ottoman or British law.
Dyfri Williams Acropolis lime Grand Vizier British Museum marble Parthenon firman Athens dizdar Greece Ottomans