The so-called Elgin Marbles are a set of Greek sculptures taken from the Parthenon and other areas on the Acropolis in Athens by Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, in the early nineteenth century. Elgin sold them to the British government, which put them on display in the British Museum. Keats visited them in 1817.
At the time they provided English viewers with their first chance to see authentic sculptures from ancient Greece, and fed the hunger for all things Hellenic. They’re among the world’s greatest works of art, and if you haven’t seen images, do look at them. The Wikipedia page isn’t a bad place to start.
They’re still on display in the British Museum, and have been a subject of contention ever since, with Greek officials calling for the return of stolen artwork. The government of the UK maintains they were obtained legally.
On Seeing the Elgin Marbles |
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| My spirit is too weak — mortality | ||
| Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep, | ||
| And each imagin’d pinnacle and steep | ||
| Of godlike hardship tells me I must die | ||
| Like a sick Eagle looking at the sky. | ||
| Yet ’tis a gentle luxury to weep | ||
| That I have not the cloudy winds to keep | ||
| Fresh for the opening of the morning’s eye. | ||
| Such dim-conceived glories of the brain | ||
| Bring round the heart an undescribable feud; | ||
| So do these wonders a most dizzy pain, | ||
| That mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude | ||
| Wasting of old Time—with a billowy main° — | ocean | |
| A sun — a shadow of a magnitude. |