Page 36 - Beholding Liberty!

Armed Greek on the walls of St. Euthymia in Phokida
illustration in the work of Simone Pomardi, Viaggo nella Grecia, Rome 1820
Library of the Hellenic Parliament
A Greek man rests on the Parthenon
(part), illustration in
Louis Dupré Voyage à Athènes et à Constantinople, Paris 1825 Library of the Hellenic Parliament
31. The original drawings, in sepia
and watercolours, have been found in the Gennadius Library in Athens (A collection of 120 Original
Sepia Sketches of Greek Scenery; GT 2051q)
32. Willian Haygarth, Greece, a Poem, in three parts; with note, classical illustrations, and sketches of the scenery, London, W. Bulmer
for G. and W. Nicol, 1814.
33. Spenser 1986 [1954], 281-285, Randel 1960.
34. See Macgregor Morris 2000, 224-225.
35. In their turn, the lithographs of Joly would be reproduced for the publication of F.C.H.L. Pouqueville, Grèce, Paris 1835.
is regarded as a completely fabricated ideology, or even simply exaggerated, what is certain is that it was of decisive assistance in the positive acceptance of, and contribution to, the Greek Struggle by the international public.
The revolutionary Greeks were “recognized” by the Europeans as descendants of Miltiades [cat. no II.8.A.5] and Leonidas [cat. no II.8.A.4]. The place and spirit of these great men of Antiquity were being sought by the European antiquarians. And they observed the Greece of their era through glasses – partially disfiguring – of the classical tradition.
Author and painter William Haygarth (1784-1825) visited Greece in 1810-11, together with Lord Byron and John Cam Hobhouse, where he drew dozens of Greek landscapes and monuments,31 two of which were in the region of Thermopylae. In the winter of 1811, when Haygarth came to Athens, he wrote a poetic travel diary, with his impressions, textual and iconographic from the land of Greece. From it, the poem “Greece”,32 was published in 1814, showing an early philhellenic spirit33 and pre- pared the way for later similar compositions – such as the lyric drama Hellas (1822) by Percy Bysshe Shelley. The illustration of Thermopylae in the Haygarth publication Greece, with aquatints by Charles Turner, based on one of the sepia drawings by Haygarth, presented an idyllic landscape animated by a scene from daily life, whereas the corresponding text34 recalls the ancient struggle and the unde- feated Greeks who fell with Leonidas. Ten years later (1824), when the Greek uprising culminated, a series of views of Greece was published (Vues de la Grèce Moderne) [cat. no II.8.A.5], with lithographs by Alexis Victor Joly (1798-1814), which were in fact based mainly on the aquatints in the publication by Haygarth.35 His view of Thermopylae – the last scene in the series – haw revealed Hygarth’s view from the “humble” cart in the foreground, while has a “sublime” inscribed fragment. The related text – which is owed to an unidentified author (Emilie de L.), which is why the publication is known by the name of A.V. Joly – describes the region with the hot springs, refers to Leonidas and compares the heroism of the contemporary Greeks with their ancient ancestors. In this way Haygarth’s pre-revolu- tionary antiquity worship served to recall Thermopylae (by Joly) in the middle of the Greek Revolution, changing antiquity worship and hellenomania into pure Philhellenism.
In the end, the image created by the travellers, neoclassicists and romantics regarding Greek Antiqui- ty before the revolution, is also appropriate for the modern Greeks, as it determines the total image
36 BEHOLDING LIBERTY!