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~ An Antipodean View on Classical Greece, Rome & the Mediterranean.

inlustre monumentum est

Tag Archives: Europe

Austerity is destroying Antiquity (New York Times)

12 Tuesday Jun 2012

Posted by scot mcphee in Archaeology, Economics, Greek History

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antiquities, austerity, economics, Europe, Eurozone crisis, greece, modern life is rubbish, state of the classics

Very sad to read the following. This is why austerity measures are self-defeating; the profit of banks is placed above all other considerations including the common heritage of all European culture!

Archaeologists Say Greek Antiquities Threatened by Austerity – NYTimes.com:

In a dry riverbed one late April morning on the island of Kythira, Aris Tsaravopoulos, a former government archaeologist who was pushed out of his job in November, pointed out a site where a section of riverbank had collapsed during a rainstorm a few months earlier. Scattered all along the bed as it stretched toward the Mediterranean were hundreds of pieces of Minoan pottery, most likely dating to the second millennium B.C., some of them painted with floral patterns that were still a vivid red.

Mr. Tsaravopoulos, who directed archaeological projects and supervised foreign digs on the island for more than 15 years, said he believed the site might be part of a tomb or an ancient dumping ground. (Extensive digs in the mid-1960s by British archaeologists helped establish that the island was a longtime colony of Minoan Crete.) The collapse of the bank had already caused some of the artifacts to wash out to sea. Filling the pockets of his khaki vest with larger pieces of pottery to date and place in storage, Mr. Tsaravopoulos said, “The next big rain will carry away more, and before long it will all be gone.

Thieves loot Greece’s Ancient Olympia museum – BBC

18 Saturday Feb 2012

Posted by scot mcphee in 21st Century History, Archaeology, Economics, Greek History, News Items

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economics, Europe, Eurozone crisis, stolen antiquities

BBC News – Thieves loot Greece’s Ancient Olympia museum:

Armed robbers have stolen dozens of artefacts from a Greek museum dedicated to the history of the early Olympics.

Two masked men smashed display cabinets and took more than 60 objects after overpowering a guard at the museum in Olympia, officials said.

If you read a little further into the article you’ll see that Greek museums are short 1500 guards because of government budget cuts. This is what “austerity” does – it doesn’t solve problems, it creates them. Germany and France are forcing the Greeks “to take their medicine” for their former profligacy. However Germany in particular — as an export-driven economy — has benefitted from the low Euro value that the Greek crisis precipitated. They weren’t asking questions when they were still selling BMWs in Greece. Not every economy can be like Germany’s. If the Europeans really want a properly federated Euro zone, they have to face the fact that the richer regions have to subsidise the poorer regions. It’s what happens in Australia – Tasmania and South Australia get far more money back than they put in. It’s a necessity to have a functional federation.

Available for rent: The Acropolis, for under $2000 a day

18 Wednesday Jan 2012

Posted by scot mcphee in 21st Century History, Archaeology, News Items

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acropolis, commerce, Europe, Eurozone crisis

So … how long before some 2nd assistant grip chisels a chunk off a column so they can get their 35mm Arri rig on the dolly shot fixed right? Any takers on that?

Available for rent: The Acropolis, for under $2000 a day:

The ministry says the move is a common-sense way of helping “facilitate” access to the country’s ancient Greek ruins, and money generated would fund the upkeep and monitoring of sites. The first site to be opened would be the Acropolis.

Archaeologists, however, have for decades slammed such an initiative as sacrilege.

(Via Brisbane Times.)

It’s time to wrestle back la dolce vita

22 Tuesday Nov 2011

Posted by scot mcphee in 21st Century History, Economics, Roman History

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economics, Europe, Eurozone crisis

It’s a commonplace to connect the current troubles in Greece, Italy and Spain with some connection to ancient Greece or Rome. Mostly such connections are tenuous at best. However, here Guy Rundle makes the most lucid connection between the European crisis of now and its classical past that I’ve read on the internets.

Eurozone crisis: as Eurozone collapses, it’s time to wrestle back la dolce vita | Guy Rundle | Crikey:

You can do that when the contagion is contained in Europe. The continent’s fissiparous nature is, after all, the result of an earlier failure and collapse – the inability of Rome to conquer the Germans in the first century, followed by the financial crisis of the mid 200s, when the gold and silver currency was adulterated by an early version of quantitative easing. Intra-imperial trade collapsed because no-one could trust the coinage, and the economy relocalised – creating the national identities we know today. Had that not happened, for better or worse, Europe might be more like China, a single Latin empire unified over two millennia.

(Via Crikey.)

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