“Paris, Copenhagen, Würzburg, Karlsruhe and especially London are the cities where fragments of the Parthenon stolen from Greece still groan today,” says the Italian writer Andrea Marcologo in her article published in the French newspaper Liberation, on the occasion of the Paris Book Fair. festival.

Markologist makes special mention of the recent decision of the Vatican to return three marble heads to Greece, but also at the request of Greece for the return of the sculptures of the Parthenon.

Recalling Lord Byron’s “prophetic” poem “The Curse of Athena”, the author notes that some countries finally decided to react, such as Italy, which returned to the Acropolis Museum part of the east frieze, which until 2022 was kept in the Archaeological Museum. Museum of Palermo, where it was transferred at the beginning of the 19th century under unclear circumstances.

“Pope Francis has declared that he wants to right more than 200 years of injustice, and this stance was welcomed by Lina Mendoni, the Minister of Culture of Greece,” the Italian writer reports, emphasizing that where politics does not have or does not want to have, the law is inside (because works of art of the state are inalienable and in no case can be transferred), there is religion.

As he remarks, the return of the three heads to Greece was made in the context of a donation from the Catholic Church to the Orthodox Church, and not a return from state to state.. The Pope offered the sculptures to Archbishop Hieronymus II, who in turn decided to donate them to the Acropolis Museum, he notes.