Sitting atop the Acropolis, the Parthenon has stood for over 2,500 years, bearing witness to the rise of European civilization. Yet its story is also one of loss and dispute.

Less than 300 meters from the Parthenon, the Acropolis Museum displays fewer than half of the temple's original sculptures. The missing pieces are replaced with plaster casts, marked by black dots - a quiet but powerful reminder of absence. 

More than half of the marbles were removed in the early 19th century by Lord Elgin, then British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, under the pretext of "copying and recording." In reality, this meant the large-scale dismantling and shipment of these ancient works to Britain, where they remain today in the British Museum.

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The Parthenon Marbles: A new film by CGTN Europe

CGTN Europe presents A Great British Theft?, a film that brings together museum directors, historians, archaeologists, and cultural heritage lawyers to examine one of the world's longest-running cultural property conflicts. For more than two centuries, the fate of the Parthenon Marbles has strained relations between Britain and Greece.

At the heart of the debate lies a pressing question: is this a story of preservation, or of plunder carried out under the guise of legality? And for cultural artifacts taken from their homelands—should they be returned?