In an interview with the Telegraph, Sir John Boardman, a leading British art historian, warned Amal Alamuddin and her partner Geoffrey Robertson that any move to return the Parthenon Marbles to Greece will set an “appalling precedent” for art repatriation around the world.
The Oxford historian warned that, were such an effort to prove successful, it would “ruin major museums” throughout Europe. Boardman, professor of Classical archaeology and art at Oxford University, explained that the Parthenon Marbles’ return to Greece would kick-start repatriation claims in museums throughout the world, precipitating a vicious and unsolvable series of legal disputes. He went so far as to urge the British Museum to dismiss any renewed claim. “Legally they (the British Museum) are in a very strong position,” he noted.
The return of the Parthenon Marbles “would set a whole flood of things going as well. It would make an appalling precedent and it would ruin any of the major museums of the world.” He cited the examples of the British Museum, the Louvre, and the Museum of Berlin, all of which have in their possession artifacts from what is now Turkey. “You would get all mixed up with nationalities and who owned what when,” Boardman continued.
Meanwhile, the British Museum reiterated their usual stance on the issue: “The Parthenon sculptures in London are an important representation of ancient Athenian civilization in the context of world history.”