The Bronze Fragments of the Acropolis

It is a misfortune almost necessarily incidental to the excavation of any site so rich in ancient remains as the Acropolis at Athens, that smaller objects and such as have a less obvious archaeological value, are sadly neglected: and the fate of the bronze fragments excavated during the seasons 1885—9 affords the strongest proof of this fact. At the time of the excavation the Greek authorities selected those objects in bronze which had any obvious archaeological interest, and placed these in the larger Museum on the Acropolis. All the other bronze remains were indiscriminately and somewhat carelessly packed in several large boxes and stored in the small Museum. The evil results of this are twofold: in the first place, owing to careless storing and the piling of heavy objects on the top of light, a large number of fragments have been further broken up; and secondly, there is absolutely no record of the place or depth at which any of these were found. How important such a record would have been, will be well realized by any student of Dr. Furtwängler's great work on the Olympia bronzes, though this same also does much to lessen the gravity of our loss.