In case you missed this one, here’s a great little piece by Ada Calhoun about the return of a small marble fragment to ancient Corinth three decades after it was stolen.
“I grew up in the East Village, in New York City, surrounded by art. Most of it was contemporary, but there was one piece that was old — really old. It was a fragment of an ancient marble column, and we used it as a doorstop. I’d never seen marble like that outside of the Metropolitan Museum — marble that changed color with the time of day, almost as if it were blushing. After looking at the marble for 30 years, I finally asked where it was from….
My mother, husband, 1-year-old son and I flew to Athens with the relic in a carry-on. A sweltering suburban train and bumpy taxi ride took us to Corinth. We tramped up a dusty road, past postcard sellers, under the midday sun, until we reached the Corinth archaeological site — a cream-colored building with a green door, where, we were told, we should take our artifact. Our knock was answered by a suave, gray-haired British man, Guy Sanders, director of the American School’s excavations there…”
Read the full piece here.
Corinthian Matters 