Maria Hill has alerted us to the
following article in the New York Times re: the situation on Kythera and in Greece ,
generally re: Archaeology – it features Aris Tsaravopoulos and Gely Fragou
New York Times
KYTHIRA, Greece
George Poulos
By RANDY
KENNEDY
Published: June 11, 2012
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/12/arts/design/archaeologists-say-greek-antiquities-threatened-by-austerity.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
A version of this article appeared in print on June 12, 2012, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Greek Antiquities, Long Fragile, Are Endangered by Austerity.
A version of this article appeared in print on June 12, 2012, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Greek Antiquities, Long Fragile, Are Endangered by Austerity.
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| A
closed room at the |
KYTHIRA, Greece — A jarring public-awareness ad that has appeared recently on
Greek television news shows a little girl strolling with her mother through the
National Archaeological Museum in Athens, one of the country’s cultural crown
jewels. The girl skips off by herself, and as she stands alone before a
2,500-year-old marble statue, a hand suddenly sweeps in from behind, covering
her mouth and yanking her away.
Multimedia
Aris Tsaravopoulos, a government archaeologist who was pushed out of his job in November, and a student inspect a piece of Minoan pottery at a site on Kythira. More Photos »
An instant later, she reappears, apparently unharmed but staring forlornly at an empty plinth: The kidnappers weren’t after the girl — they were after the statue.
Multimedia
Aris Tsaravopoulos, a government archaeologist who was pushed out of his job in November, and a student inspect a piece of Minoan pottery at a site on Kythira. More Photos »
An instant later, she reappears, apparently unharmed but staring forlornly at an empty plinth: The kidnappers weren’t after the girl — they were after the statue.
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Gely Fragou, an
archaeologist, at the
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The ad,
produced by the Association of Greek Archaeologists, is most immediately a
reminder of an armed robbery of dozens of artifacts from a museum in Olympia Greece
by the European economic establishment, measures that have led in recent weeks
to an electoral crisis, a caretaker government and the specter of Greece
Effects of the
cultural cuts are already being felt by the public, as museum galleries and
sometimes whole museums suffer from sporadic closings.
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The profession of
archaeology has long been held in high esteem in
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
|
But Greek and international archaeologists and curators warn that the real
consequences of the cuts will not become fully apparent for years and will be
far more dire for ancient artifacts and historical scholarship. Over the last
six months dozens of the country’s most experienced state archaeologists —
those with the highest number of years of service and highest salaries, 1,550
euros a month, or a little less than $2,000 — have been forced into early
retirement as part of a 10 percent staff reduction within the government’s
Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Through regular retirements and attrition over
the last two years, the archaeological staff has shrunk even more, to 900 from
1,100, according to the association, the union that represents the
archaeologists.
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Gely Fragou, a
31-year-old Greek archaeologist, worked on short government contracts until the
last one expired in 2010. She said that several friends have taken day jobs to
make ends meet: One works in a bakery, another on an assembly line, and a third
as a trash collector in
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
|
At a time when taxes are being raised, pensions are being cut and the national
unemployment rate stands at more than 21 percent, this exodus has faded quickly
into the bleak economic landscape. But scholars say the cuts are beginning to
cause precisely what the television ad dramatizes: the disappearance of
antiquities. The primary culprits are not museum robbers and looters of
antiquities sites, but two even more treacherous forces that now have fewer
checks on their power: the elements and developers’ bulldozers.
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.
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.”
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Sites in
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
|
In years past
Mr. Tsaravopoulos would have organized an emergency dig at such a site. Now, he
said, he can no longer do anything but alert already overburdened colleagues in
the state archaeological service, with little hope any rescue work will be done
in time: Since his forced retirement last fall, Kythira, a sparsely populated
island slightly larger than Malta and six hours southwest of Athens by ferry,
had not been visited by a government archaeologist.
Of course, long
before the economic meltdown, sites were lost or poorly kept, partly as a
result of the immensity of the task of preserving the county’s past. In Kythira
alone, there might well be dozens of such unexplored sites; the Greek truism
that you can’t turn a corner without tripping over an antiquity often seems
almost literally true. (The country has 19,000 declared archaeological sites
and monuments and 210 antiquities museums.)
“I believe that this ministry could double or triple the number of archaeologists it hires — and the number of guards — and still be understaffed,” saidPavlos Geroulanos , Greece
“I believe that this ministry could double or triple the number of archaeologists it hires — and the number of guards — and still be understaffed,” said
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Mr. Tsaravopoulos
recently came upon a collapsed section of riverbank strewn with hundreds of
pieces of Minoan pottery, most likely dating to the second millennium B.C. Some
of the artifacts had washed out to sea.
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
|
But now
Greece’s already hidebound and inefficient archaeological bureaucracy, for
years among the largest in Europe (where the state plays a central role in the
field in many countries), is confronting a drop in resources so sharp that it
is beginning to cede the responsibility for cultural heritage it has had for
more than 150 years.
In Messenia, on
the Peloponnesian peninsula, excavation work has come to a halt on a fifth- or
sixth-century B.C. mountaintop temple discovered in 2010 not far from the
well-known Temple
of Epicurean Apollo
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Mr. Tsaravopoulos with
salvaged pieces Minoan pottery. In years past he would have organized an
emergency dig at such a site. Now, he said, he can no longer do anything but
alert already overburdened colleagues in the state archaeological service.
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
|
“There’s still
work that needs to be done there, but no one goes to do it,” Ms. Arapogianni
said in an interview. “A department cannot function without a director.”
She added that the temple was not important simply as another place that might someday dot a tourist map but because the history of fifth-century temple cults in the region is still an emerging field of research, and the site could provide crucial insights. “This is not just another temple,” she said.
To many Greek archaeologists and university colleagues from other countries who dig with the government’s permission, an even more troubling repercussion of the austerity budget is that research leaves of absence for government archaeologists are being canceled, and money for their research excavations is no longer being provided unless they can find other sources to share the cost.
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Elsewhere on Kythira, Mr.
Tsaravopoulos recently heard about a bulldozer that had been at work without a
permit or antiquities inspection. He arrived to find a makeshift dirt road
freshly carved into a hillside, scattered with dozens of broken pieces of
glazed pottery dating to Hellenic and early Roman times. “I have no power
anymore to prevent people from digging wherever they want,” he said.
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
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One effect is that Greek archaeologists are being pushed to focus almost
exclusively on the more bureaucratic side of their jobs: inspecting
construction sites for the presence of buried antiquities. It is a crucial
task, but one that, even with the slowdown of development during the crisis,
consumes almost all their time now. This means that scholarship is put on
indefinite, and in some cases probably permanent, hold.
An American
archaeologist with decades of experience in Greece, who spoke on condition of
anonymity for fear of alienating government officials at such an uncertain
time, said: “Nobody in Greece digs nearly as much as the government
archaeological service. And if they aren’t able to publish what they find, they
might as well not be doing it at all; they might as well just rebury it.”
Despite its
relatively low pay, the profession of archaeology has long been held in high
esteem in Greece
“They used to
say that we were a special race,” said Alexandra Christopoulou, the deputy
director of the National
Archaeological Museum Greece
Veteran Greek
archaeologists tend to view the crisis with a grim resolve to make do with the
resources at hand. But many in the next generation are unable to do even that.
The archaeological service has all but stopped hiring, and the hundreds of
young archaeologists who work on part-time contracts are finding those
contracts renewed more infrequently.
Gely Fragou, a 31-year-old Greek archaeologist trained at theUniversity of Southampton ,
in England Athens Greece
Gely Fragou, a 31-year-old Greek archaeologist trained at the
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Dozens of the country’s
most experienced state archaeologists have been pushed into early
retirement. Aris Tsaravopoulos, a former government archaeologist,
shown at a cave site on the
Credit: Eirini Vourloumis
for The New York Times
|
Mr. Geroulanos,
who served as the culture minister for two and half years, an unusually long
stretch amid Greece ’s shifting
political alliances, said the deep staff cuts were unavoidable in order to make
the strongest case that his ministry could live within its means, as the rest
of Greece
“We’re at a time now,” he said in an interview in his office in
Even with the ministry’s budget falling every year of his tenure, he said, it has been able to complete important projects, like modernizing the facilities at more than 100 publicly accessible ancient sites. Over the last three years
But critics of austerity say these few bright spots pale against the irreversible damage already under way.
On the
As he was leaving, the owner of the land arrived with his family, and he and Mr. Tsaravopoulos, who knew him, had a curt discussion in the middle of the road before the man walked on.
“He told me he didn’t realize he’d damaged any artifacts and that he was sorry,” Mr. Tsaravopoulos said later. “Then he told me very nicely: ‘Oh Aris, I heard the news that you had to retire. I’m very sorry about that.’ He knows that I have no power anymore to prevent people from digging wherever they want.”
A version of this article appeared in print on June 12, 2012, on page A1 of the
