pothos.org

The correct word would be that the marbles were officialy looted.Greece had no say because at that time Greece was occupied by the Turks.There was no Greek goverment.The Sultan handed the marbles officialy at Elgin.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles

The british museum is full of artifacts from all over the world, and most of them of course were taken with one way or the other.Mostly off Britains' colonies, and from countries like Greece that couldnt do otherwise at the time.

So yes, Elgin took them officialy, but he didnt at all care for the marbles to stay where they belonged, but to be a part of London's museum.

Take the time and read the link that i posted.And especially the section called "Damage to marbles".

And another thing for understanding what exactly happened then.

It isnt like Elgin took something from an excavation.An armor, some pots, or jewelry (although he took many of these items too) , he took something that was on the Parthenon for 2.500 years.He removed the marbles from it.It's like if he could he would take the entire building with him.

For 2.500 years many people passed from Athens.Enemies that raided the city, and eventually the Turks that were there for almost 400 years.And even the most barbaric ones respected the ancient buildings and the Parthenon.With the exception of the Sultan that decided to store ammunition in there and eventually there was an explosion.And then Elgin came and removed the marbles.If every man like Elgin that had gone to the Parthenon removed something from there there wouldnt be a Parthenon today.There is absolutely no excuse for what he did.Even the excuse that he may wanted to save them, is false, because the british museum is full of many other items too, that didnt need to be saved.

I dont accuse a whole nation for this.There are people and people.Other English men have protested against these actions.And other English men have even given their own lives for Greece to be free, like Lord Byron, who was a Lord with a capital "L".

jan wrote:My personal problem has been one of learning whether I am simply very psychic and have the key to learning all that there is spiritually about Alexander, as I have a book full of images and information, or whether it is a concept of reincarnation...and all that is questionable too. The point is that I have a vivid photographic memory and many images have come to me which I retain at this point, including that of his helmet at Gaugemela, and his actual real cuirass in its actual real physical makeup, but all these are encased in spiritual record, and none can be found physically today. So the problem is what to do? Keep them to myself, write a book, publish them, keep my mouth shut...

Hmm, you run a real risk if you publish your "memories", Jan. Better to keep them to yourself.

Physically, I believe that the Macedonians were all muscular, were all massive, very athletic, and very fierce and strong...an entire group of men like Arnold Schwarzenegger and The Rock...all so frighteningly huge as to make your head spin...

I can hardly think of what to say here, Jan. I remember that this has come up before, about 4 years ago. Are you sure you're not indulging somewhat in fantasy? - and I'm not knocking it, considering how I reacted to Angelina Jolie as Olympias! Still, keep all this to yourself, I would.

Alexander deserves better than he has gotten so far.

In your opinion, Jan, don't forget. In your opinion.

ATB

I very much doubt that the Macedonians or Alexander was built like Arnold or the Rock todays males Men Are even different to men decades ago. We see young kids with muscle and really big. ITs to do with todays food additives and may I add some of the subsatnces that get pumped into the Bodies. Arnoild is weel knows for use of Steroids.

In my opinion body builders are no way natural. If the Macedonians were like Arnold they would have no stamina. Muscle takes a lot of feeding and eats a lot of energy. We see body builders who are cumbersome and cant run long distances nor are they built for speed.

The evidence shows that Mediteranians etc were on average short guys around 5.6. And the idea of big muscly guys been the guys is crap. We know what the Romans and Macedonians lacked in size and stature. They made up for in Tactics training and Discipline. We hera for example Gauls etc large in stature and looking darned Fierce but it meant diddly Shit against those drilled lines of Roman legionaries.

I often used to laugh at the Hollywood Muscle Guys. Stallone Arnie etc Blasting away with a Machine Gun Muscles Rippling. I could just imagine the Little 5.6 SAS Soldier just taking his time from range etc and just putting one round straight throu Rambos napper. I personally think is why the American Soldiers get it wrong they are too much Gun Ho and hollywood.


Sorry Jan your way off with your steriotypical Macedonians. Size and Muscles means nothing against brains and tactics. Bruce Lee was a small. Very small guy fair enough with Muscle unlike Arnies Id wager one Smack From Bruce Lee well scores of fast power shots and Arnie wouldnt know what hit him.

We see boxers with toned Muscle with knock out punches lasting 15 rounds.

As for Alexander I doubt he was anywhere near 6 feet tall and we know the Macedonian Horses were small so the statues make Alexander to be of relative medium stature. ^ feet of Alexander on those horses would look a bit lop siged.

Kenny

We know what the Romans and Macedonians lacked in size and stature

The Macedonians were tall.

Their name actually says that, because it derives from makednoi,makednos whhich was first used by homer and meant tall or length.

About the muscles: Ancient Greeks had weights which they often used when they worked out.So of course they were not like Stalone or Conan the Barbarian, but they had muscles.We can see that on the statues too.Generally the statues represented the ideal body as the Athenians percieved it, and were based on real models.

So Jan is not far away from the truth.

Over the ridge they came, to the beat of the drums and alternate crash of pike on shield. A massed block of drill hardened humanity, they resembled nothing so much as a mobile palisade of pikes and covered the slope – end to end – like ants, marching in perfect unison as they debouched upon the plain.

Up close they were sinewy, hard “muscle and bone” types; athletic though, not overly tall with calloused hands and broken, dirty finger nails. Their armour covered myriads of scars, the calling cards of former enemies broken on other fields. From their Phrygian helms hung rank, sweat riddled hair and lice infested beards surrounded cracked, sunburnt lips that would soon be parted for the battle cry that had presaged the end of many a former army.

It was not all this – unnerving though it well was – that so unsettled the Athenian ranks. As the northerly breeze stiffened behind the line of enemy advance, gentile Athenian nostrils – long since having forgotten the smell of infantry war, if many had ever known it – flared as the pungent odours of battle assailed them. Sweat mixed with the oils and body odours of thousands of unwashed bodies and intermingled with the stringent stench of urine and faeces. The Athenian hoplites, blanched but not beaten, stood their ground.

As the enemy closed on the Athenian ranks, the breeze carried the war cry of tens of thousands across the rapidly shortening no man’s land. For the unfortunate and inexperienced hoplites, it also carried the breath of the enemy phalangites. Breath made rancid as it issued from infected throats and passed over the stumps of broken and rotted teeth. Breath that carried the sweet foulness of dried meat and dried fish; of onions, barely meal and garlic which clung, still, to the gaps between those teeth.

This was the feared Macedonian phalanx. The Athenians, not for the first time, considered incontinent flight as the battle tactic of choice.

HI Marcus, Was it four years ago? I do remember that I did mention it here, and again, it is not a result of sources, so I will not mention it here again. Naturally, all of Stone's movie is just an opinion, as is Steve Pressfield's Virtue of War and The Aghanistan Campaign, as well as all of Mary Renault's books of fiction and nonfiction. Everything is a matter of opinion. Nothing is factual by any author or painter of modern times, so my opinion is worth as much or more as the next guy's...or ladie's...But I do have to admit that that is a dilemma that Kenny made me consider as well.

In my opinion, many artists of the past have caught and presented portraits that do emphasize the muscular aspect of Alexander, Hephaestion, and his army and they are still standing in many places. The movie The Scorpion King is a much better representation of the times than the movie Alexander that Stone directed. I noticed the full respect in the Scorpion King versus the Mash like atmosphere of the Macedonians in Stone's version and I daresay that The Rock is better than Colin Farrell in Alexander.

I respect The Rock for his performance in the Scorpion King. I have no respect for Colin Farrell or Oliver Stone.

First, I would turn over any archeological discovery. Not because my ethics are better that anyone else's but because my ego would demand that the exhibit give me credit for finding the treasure with a nice plaque. Petty, yeah but what the hell.

Alexander's sexuality has been discussed ad infinitum. Contrary to popular belief, homosexuality was not the norm in Ancient Greece. It existed, there were relationships between older men and younger but not what is often portrayed. There are articles on www.macedoniaontheweb.com and the Alexander the Great forum (link is on the macedonia site) that examine this with scholarly evidence. Stone's version trivialized Alexander by focusing on an undocumented, unproven allegation.

Here's the website:
http://www.thegreatalexander.com/alexan ... ad.php?t=7

more on www.macedoniaontheweb.com

That Alexander and Heapaestion shared sexual relations, I've very little doubt. That it then continued, rather less comsumatingly, into adulhood, I think, is certain. One thing is without doubt and that is that Alexander had three relationships for life: his mother; competition with his father (and sundry gods) and Hephaestion. This last was the personal relationship of his life. Craterus and Eumenes should well have known to steer clear of upsetting a "wife".

Of course there were homo-erotic relationships in ancient Greece. It was part of life. It was not seen at all the way we now view "homosexuality", that is, as a separate sexuality. Thus there is no "bi-sexuality" in ancient Greece. It was generally something that one "put away" with the gaining of age and marriage. This, though, did not stop such relationships continuing after such, which, in Athens -- from which we get much of our evidence -- were frowned upon.

Not so in Sparta. The Agoge actively favoured such relationships. To think otherwise is to bury one's head in the sands of the Eurotas delta. One needs only to recall Xenophon's description (Hellenica IV.1.39-40) of the Persian boy "who was still at the most beautiful age" that so took Agesilaos' eye. This fellow had made tha horrible error of "falling in love with the son of Eualces" and Agesilaos gave him "all the help he could".

As he would. Given his lame leg, he could well do without losing that eye.

Well, i am only going to remind Aristophanes' mockery on homosexuality on his plays.He had scenes where men that were supposedly homosexuals were dressed and behaved like women and were mocked.

Now think about that a little bit.They had no word for homosexuality, except the word "kinaidos".This word described the abhnormal behaviour af homosexuality.Either you were adult either a boy, this behaviour is the same ,nothing changes.So it must have applied to both.It is very aukward to say that they were mocking adult homosexuals but not the young.(As in "eromenos" and "erastis"). So adult with young yes, but not adult with adult?

And let me ask one thing.In order to have such a behaviour, there must have been the need for it right? And if there was this need among almost all men, then surely it would have passed through the centuries.Right? Because a need is biological.Even if you suppress it ,it is there.So why now most of people in Greece dont have this need?This doesnt have to do with religions, but with biology.If the need was there back then, it would be here now.But it isnt.

Plus there isnt any text that says that when Christianity arrived suddenly the Athenians or the Greeks generally suppressed their homosexual needs because of the religion.But even if something like that has happened, wouldnt the need still be here?

Plus i cannot accept the fact that every boy or adult liked to kiss another man.This is abhnormal, even of your society made you to do it.It wouldnt work.

Just some things for thought.