Blue Parthenon

June 26, 2009

The Parthenon Marbles again. A new imaging technique developed by the British Museum has found that the Elgin Marbles were originally coated with shades of blue (here is the full story).

Although scholars have long suspected that the Parthenon was once brightly colored, no evidence has previously been found to support this belief. Now the new study finally confirms that Athens' most sacred shrine was brigthly colored.

The splash of color in the Parthenon was not exception in antiquity. Last year, an intriguing exhibition called Gods in Color: Painted Sculpture of Classical Antiquity clearly showed that antique marble sculpture was not white, but colored.

Resulting from a 25 year research by an international team of of scholars led by Vinzenz Brinkmann, head of the Collection of Antiques of the Liebieghaus in Frankfurt, Germany, the exhibition reproduced more than 20 copies of famous ancient Greek marble statues and sculptures in their true colors of blue, red, green and yellow.