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Updated: May 27, 2025
He has besides made accurate drawings of all the bas-reliefs on the several temples, in the precise state of decay and mutilation in which they at present exist. Most of the bassi rilievi, and nearly all the characteristic features of architecture in the various monuments at Athens, have been moulded, and the moulds of them brought to London.
Commodus erected to the memory of his father the Antonine column which is now in the Piazza Colonna at Rome. The bassi rilievi which are placed in a spiral line round the shaft commemorate the victories of Antoninus over the Marcomanni and the Quadi, and the miraculous shower of rain which refreshed the Roman soldiers and discomfited their enemies.
Great difficulty occurred in forming a plan for deriving the utmost advantage from the marbles and casts. Lord Elgin's first attempt was to have the statues and bassi rilievi restored; and in that view he went to Rome to consult and to employ Canova. The decision of that most eminent artist was conclusive.
The barge was a magnificent gilded Bucentaur, presented to the late Duke's father by the Doge of Venice, and carved by his Serenity's most famous sculptors in wood. Tritons and sea-goddesses encircled the prow and throned above the stern, and the interior of the deck-house was adorned with delicate rilievi and painted by Tiepolo with scenes from the myth of Amphitrite.
Actuated by these inducements, Lord Elgin made every exertion; and the sacrifices he has made have been attended with such entire success, that he has brought to England from the ruined temples at Athens, from the modern walls and fortifications, in which many fragments had been used as blocks for building, and from excavations from amongst the ruins, made on purpose, such a mass of Athenian sculpture, in statues, alti and bassi rilievi, capitals, cornices, friezes, and columns as, with the aid of a few of the casts, to present all the sculpture and architecture of any value to the artist or man of taste which can be traced at Athens.
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