Who Saved the Parthenon?

William St Clair

Description

In this magisterial book, William St Clair unfolds the history of the Parthenon throughout the modern era to the present day, with special emphasis on the period before, during, and after the Greek War of Independence of 1821–32. Focusing particularly on the question of who saved the Parthenon from destruction during this conflict, with the help of documents that shed a new light on this enduring question, he explores the contributions made by the Philhellenes, Ancient Athenians, Ottomans and the Great Powers.

Marshalling a vast amount of primary evidence, much of it previously unexamined and published here for the first time, St Clair rigorously explores the multiple ways in which the Parthenon has served both as a cultural icon onto which meanings are projected and as a symbol of particular national, religious and racial identities, as well as how it illuminates larger questions about the uses of built heritage. This book has a companion volume with the classical Parthenon as its main focus, which offers new ways of recovering the monument and its meanings in ancient times.

St Clair builds on the success of his classic text, The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period, to present this rich and authoritative account of the Parthenon’s presentation and reception throughout history. With weighty implications for the present life of the Parthenon, it is itself a monumental contribution to accounts of the Greek Revolution, to classical studies, and to intellectual history.

Sujets

• Architecture
• Parthénon
• History
• Parthenon
• National identity
• Cultural icon
• architectural history
• ancient
• classical

Informations

• Publié par: Open Book Publishers
• Date de parution: 26 mai 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 2
• EAN13: 9781783744640
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 22 Mo

Extrait

Who Saved the Parthenon?

Who Saved the Parthenon?
A New History of the Acropolis Before, During and After the Greek Revolution
William St Clair





https://www.openbookpublishers.com
© 2022 William St Clair. © 2022 Preface by Roderick Beaton




This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work for non-commercial purposes, providing attribution is made to the author (but not in any way that suggests that he endorses you or your use of the work). Attribution should include the following information:
William St Clair, Who Saved the Parthenon? A New History of the Acropolis Before, During and After the Greek Revolution . Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2022, https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0136
Copyright and permissions for the reuse of many of the images included in this publication differ from the above. This information is provided in the captions and in the list of illustrations.
In order to access detailed and updated information on the license, please visit https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0136#copyright . Further details about CC BY-NC-ND licenses are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
All external links were active at the time of publication unless otherwise stated and have been archived via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine at https://archive.org/web
Digital material and resources associated with this volume are available at https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0136#resources
Every effort has been made to identify and contact copyright holders and any omission or error will be corrected if notification is made to the publisher.
ISBN Paperback: 9781783744619
ISBN Hardback: 9781783744626
ISBN Digital (PDF): 9781783744633
ISBN Digital ebook (epub): 9781783744640
ISBN Digital ebook (mobi): 9781783744657
ISBN XML: 9781800642997
DOI: 10.11647/OBP.0136
Cover image: Figure 2.7. ‘View of the Acropolis from the banks of the Illysus, Sep r 1824.’ Chromolithograph from a contemporary amateur picture. From: William Black, L.R.C.S.E., Surgeon, H.M.S. Chanticleer, Narrative of Cruises in the Mediterranean in H.M.S. “Euryalus” and “Chanticleer” during the Greek War of Independence (1822–1826) (Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1900), frontispiece. The chromolithograph was made by McLagan and Cumming of Edinburgh c .1900. Public domain.
Cover design by Anna Gatti.

Contents
Editors’ Note
xiii
David St Clair and Lucy Barnes
Preface
xv
Roderick Beaton
1.
Why Another Book?
1
A ‘phantom limb’: the Ottoman Empire and the Revolution
6
The Parthenon and its Meanings
10
The Structure of This Book
14
2.
The Place
21
Ottoman Athens
21
Haseki’s Wall and Siege Warfare
28
Athens and its Fortifications at the Time of the Revolution
32
Views and Maps of the Acropolis Before and During the Revolution
36
Places of Worship and Greek Cultural Heritage
42
A Changing View of the Classical Past
50
The Philhellenes and Their Influence
52
The Acropolis as a Symbol of a New Greek Identity
54
The Ecosystem of the Acropolis Before the Revolution
58
3.
The People
65
Population
65
Government and Leadership
66
Life for Christians and Muslims in Athens
68
Cooperation between Christians and Muslims
72
Clothing
73
Farming, Diet and Health
74
Ethnic Minorities and Slavery in Athens
74
The Residents of the Acropolis
79
4.
The Encounter
81
Classically-Educated Visitors
81
Recovering the Ancient World through Meursius and Pausanius
83
Visitors to Athens in the Long Eighteenth Century
88
The ‘Franks’ of Athens and Elgin’s Acquisitions
106
The Treatment of Ancient Objects Before the Revolution
109
Travelling to Athens and Viewing the Acropolis: Representations of the Experience
113
Recording the Visit
122
Providentialism and the Ancient Monuments of Athens
136
5.
Communities, Real and Imagined
141
6.
The Evidence
151
Visual Display and its Uses
156
Ottoman Attitudes and Policies
163
Communication Difficulties during the Revolution
166
The Ottoman Perspective
176
7.
The New Science and its Enemies.
181
A Tiny Republic of Letters: Spon, Wheler, Vernon and Eastcote
183
Objects, Stone Inscriptions and Artifacts: What They Could Tell
187
Reading versus Observation: Contested Ways of Seeing
194
Controlling the Narrative: The Counter-Scientific Backlash
209
8.
Towards a Practical Theory of History
213
The Role of Topography and Climate in History
216
Telling Histories, Constructing Narratives
220
The Stories and the Place: Athens and its Relationship to the History-Makers
225
‘Living Inscriptions’: Custom as a Form of Ancient Knowledge
232
9.
Romanticism and its Rhetorics
237
Romantic Aesthetics and the Place of the Parthenon
237
Walter Pater and the Western Romantic Aesthetic
242
Venerating Pheidias: Attitudes Towards the Ancient Sculptor
243
Romanticism versus Reality
248
10.
The Choices
251
Safe Against Siege: Finding the Water Fountain
271
11.
The Siege of 1826 and 1827
277
12.
The Surrender
287
13.
The Last Days of Ottoman Athens
305
14.
The Living
315
15.
The Dead