My name is Giovanni Lusieri and I am the Italian painter who was hired by my dear Lord Elgin to oversee the removal of the sculptures and their transportation to England. I have come to learn that our heroic deed of preserving these artifacts has met some disapproval from others. I am absolutely shocked and appalled to hear such news and I have made it my primary goal, besides recovering my lost paintings, to straighten things out.
The most appropriate thing to start with would probably be a brief summary of the events that took place involving the marbles. Lord Elgin, Thomas Bruce, became Ambassador to the Sublime Porte at Constantinople in 1799. Almost immediately, he started a project of making sketches and casts of the Athenian ruins. It was in this state of mind that I was hired in 1801 since I was known a meticulous draughtsman. Worked had been going on for a while by the time I was added to the team but our project was being threatened, despite the Disdar's approval. A firman was needed to appease the Cadi and Voivode and prevent any problems arising in the future. I personally wrote Lord Elgin to request this firman since, being in the political position that he was, he had some pull.
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"[The Disdar], however, has been threatened by the Cadi and Voivode if he should continue to admit us to the fortress, and has just told us that henceforth it was impossible to work there without a firman. I therefore beg your Excellency to have one sent to us as soon as possible, drawn up in such terms as to prevent u meeting with new difficulties in resuming and peaceably continuing our work."(Hitchens 27).
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It was not too long after I wrote this to Lord Elgin that I was given the firman. The firman stated that it was permissible to remove sculptures and engravings as long as it didn't affect the structure of the building. This enabled the removal of the marbles legally. It is true that our initial plan was to only make casts and sketches but once we discovered the peril in May of 1801 we changed our plan of action.
