Elgin Marbles

However, as with most legal arguments, this case cannot be opened and shut based on superficial analysis. It is the law everywhere (in both domestic and international cases) that, in the absence of express approval, the implication of that approval by conduct may indicate acquiescence. While there are several possible suggestions of ratification, and the most significant hint of ratification occurred when a large shipment of Marbles was held up in Piraeus due to pressure from the French to refuse permission for their embarkation. Eventually, the Ottoman government gave written orders to the Athenian authorities to permit the shipment, and the Marbles were allowed to leave for England. This is a very strong case for ratification, and should

However, unlike creating a legally valid case, there are no set rules and criterion when it comes to forming a moral position on the return of the Elgin Marbles. Debate on the morality of this issue is incredibly varied, but it is still possible to distill it into several main propositions. For example, the most common argument against ‘returnism’ is that Greece’s claim is ‘nationalist rhetoric’ that therefore deserves to fail. As Jonathan Jones claimed in a strongly-worded article for The Guardian, the Greek restitution case may be romantic, but it is also ‘doomed and false.’ The main proponents of this argument suggest that it is impossible to ‘reverse the history that began when Lord Elgin shipped these sculptures from Athens.’ The concept of cultural internationalism, as opposed to cultural nationalism, is also a particularly popular argument against returnism. The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict of May 14, 1954, states in its preamble that ‘cultural property belonging to any people whatsoever’ is ‘the cultural heritage of all mankind.’ This is the core of the cultural internationalist argument - that the Marbles are ‘the cultural heritage of all mankind’, and that all of us, from every country, has ‘an interest in the preservation and disposition of the Marbles.’ Those in favour of keeping the Marbles in Britain tend to interpret this argument with a view of cultural neutralism. In this view, as the British Museum has proved itself more than capable of displaying these works as part of humanity’s heritage, as a ‘global property’, the Marbles can therefore belong to no-one. It is further proposed within this view to cultural neutralism that arguments of cultural nationalism must fail when it comes to the Marbles, as it would imply that the Greeks have a ‘closer relationship to Hellenic civilisation than anyone