Hellenic Women and the Demand for the Return of the Parthenon Sculptures

The famed Greek histrion and taste icon Melina Mercouri embodied the tone of Greek women’s societal activism connected the satellite stage.

The precocious Culture Minister’s renowned passionateness for the Parthenon Marbles has been reignited during a caller lawsuit held successful Athens erstwhile starring Greek women’s associations from Greece and the United States, unneurotic with a radical from Australia, joined forces to reaffirm their advocacy for the reunification of the Elgin postulation of Parthenon Sculptures presently held successful the British Museum.

The Hellenic Association of Women successful Culture and Tourism (HAWCT Greece), the Hellenic American Women’s Council (HAWC USA), and Australia’s Food For Thought Network gathered astatine the St George Lycabettus Lifestyle Hotel to big the lawsuit called “The Voice of Women of Hellenism”.

Under the regard of the Acropolis,  these organisations reiterated their telephone for the Parthenon Sculptures to beryllium returned to their rightful location successful Athens.

As Chrysa Voulgaridou, the President of HAWCT Greece, declared:

 “Every measurement we instrumentality is not conscionable an event, it is simply a promise: to proceed until the Sculptures instrumentality to their rightful home, the Parthenon. Strength lies successful unity.”

Guest speakers included Olympia Anastasopoulou, Special Secretary for Alternative Dispute Resolution astatine the Ministry of Justice, who precocious projected the instauration of an Anglo-Hellenic Dialogue Council for the Parthenon Sculptures case. She highlighted the imaginable of mediation successful resolving planetary taste disputes, suggesting that alternate quality solution could connection a mutually beneficial solution and service arsenic a span for taste diplomacy betwixt Greece and the UK.

Another distinguished impermanent talker was Lila de Chaves, ethnologist and a founding subordinate and President of  the Hellenic Federation of Friends of Museums, who described the Parthenon Sculptures arsenic “the psyche of Greece.”

The historiographer Sissy Papathanasiou, Head of the Literature Department astatine the Ministry of Culture, besides delivered a paper, “The Reception of Greek Antiquity and the Diaspora”.

L-R: Olympia Anastasopoulou, Lila de Chaves and Sissy Papathanasiou

Other presentations included “The Parthenon and the Return of the Sculptures — a Demand for Justice and Culture” by Dr Mary Marouli Zilemonou, an eminent governmental scientist.

Back successful May 2000 Dr Zilemonou, successful her capableness arsenic Secretary-General of the Centre of European Studies and Humanities (“Ioannis Kapodistrias’) had helped organise a landmark planetary league successful Athens – “The Restitution of the Parthenon Marbles and the European Union : A Historical – Cultural – Legal Approach” – and was the editor-in-chief of the published measurement of the proceedings, titled “The Parthenon: The Repatriation of the Sculptures”.

Dr Mary Marouli Zilemonou (on near of photo)

This writer attended that league and the work remains an important world publication to the tract of taste restitution studies.

The historiographer Sissy Papathanasiou, Head of the Literature Department astatine the Ministry of Culture, besides delivered a paper, “The Reception of Greek Antiquity and the Diaspora”.

The evening concluded with moving recitations from the works of the Greek poets Kostis Palamas and Ioannis Polemis and the large Philhellene, Lord Byron, curated by Dr. Eugenia Arsenis, a manager and dramaturg with a doctorate successful philosophical aesthetics.

Tributes to the poesy of Kostis Palamas, Lord Byron and Ioannis Polemis, presented by Dr Eugenia Arsenis (pictured)

Kostis Palamas’ Hymn of Athena (1889) evoked the glory of Classical Athens and praised the “Great Goddess of the world”, the divinely-created Athena, for the contented and achievements embodied successful her ineffable world and monuments.

Ioannis Polemis’ poem Caryatids was nary little evocative, poignantly reflecting connected the lack of the missing Caryatid and expressing anticipation for her eventual return:

Before the Caryatids, those marble maidens,

we stood successful awe, hours upon end

Your regard unmoving, shadowed with sorrow

for the 1 stolen from us,

the 1 whose lack haunts the others,

lost to exile, swallowed by darkness,

cast to the farthest reaches of the world.

Yet I saw them whole, each 1 implicit earlier me,

and whispered hope: she excessively volition instrumentality from distant lands.

For, my love, arsenic I counted them,

I counted you among them –

never apart, ever together.

And finally, arsenic we know, Lord Byron was a fierce hostile of Lord Elgin’s removal of the Parthenon sculptures and furiously denounced Elgin’s actions successful his poems, The Curse of Minerva and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. Filled with indignation, Byron’s poesy channelled his rage against the ignoble depredations of the rapacious Elgin and the desecration of Greece’s heritage.

Recent activities by HAWCT successful Athens person continued to beforehand this noble cause. In October 2024, the presumption “The Voice of the Caryatid” highlighted the urgent request for reunification, culminating successful a photographic accumulation by the noted creator lensman creator Amalia Sotiropoulou, with works depicting the iconic missing marbl’d sister yearning to instrumentality to her birthplace.

And past successful March 2025, the lawsuit “The Voice of Melina Mercouri” was dedicated to the representation of the iconic fig who brought the contented of the Parthenon Marbles to planetary prominence.

The relation of Hellenic women successful the planetary run for the reunification of the sculptures remains vital.  Two of the astir eloquent advocates are Elly Symons and Alex Pistofidou – some members of the Acropolis Research Group – person been progressive successful media and astatine conferences, reaffirming the ethical and ineligible imperatives for the instrumentality of the sculptures.

L-R: Jim Mellas, Alex Pistofidou, Geoffrey Robertson KC and Elly Symons

Another precise progressive campaigner successful the diaspora is Stergitsa Zamagias-Hill who besides serves arsenic caput of the Australian Parthenon Association arsenic good arsenic Chief Executive Officer of The Hellenic Initiative Australia.

L-R: David Hill, Stergitsa Zamagias-Hill and the Australian Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese

As the run continues, the agreed voices of Hellenic women and their colleagues astir the satellite service arsenic a almighty reminder that the sculptures that erstwhile adorned the Parthenon indispensable yet beryllium reunited successful Athens.

George Vardas is the Arts & Culture Editor and has been an advocator for the reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures for much than 25 years.