Hearing radio reports, Enrico Tosti-Croce, a 77-year-old Chilean, decided to return a piece of ancient marble that his father had taken from near the Parthenon in the 1930s.
More than 90 years after it was taken away, a piece of marble decorated with carvings of lotus flowers has returned to Greece. Enrico Tosti-Croce, a 77-year-old Chilean, told this story after hearing on the radio that Greece was requesting Parthenon marbles from the British Museum (England).
The retired electronics engineer later recalled that his father, an Italian sailor named Gaetano, had taken “a piece of the Parthenon” during a visit to Athens in the 1930s. When he migrated to Chile in the early 1950s, the man brought the work with him, The Art Newspaper said.
A piece of Hecatompedon
Her children always saw the object enthroned in the dining room of their home in the coastal town of Vina del Mar. Enrico Tosti-Croce inherited this piece of history in 1994, after the death of his parents. It has long been a decoration in his house in Villarrica.
Hearing the radio report, the man from Chile did not hesitate to take any action. “Wow, I have a little piece of the Parthenon,” he recalled thinking of El Pais. I think it’s time to return it. » He contacted the Greek embassy, took photos, weighed the object (more than 1 kg) and returned the fragments.
After analysis, the verdict was in: the piece was not a piece of marble from the Parthenon, but rather a piece of the Hekatompedon, an even older temple, dating to the 6th century BC. It was one of the first temples built to honor the goddess Athena, destroyed by the Persian invasion and replaced by new buildings, including the Parthenon.
The Greek Ministry of Culture has informed Enrico Tosti-Croce that his marble will be included in the Greek public collection.
Athens has been demanding for decades from the British Museum, based in London, the return of statues, including decorations from the Parthenon temple, built in the 5th century BC on the top of the Acropolis. According to Greece, they were looted in 1802 by Lord Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire.
