Philosophical question regarding ruins...

[Boerseun]

Well, now... seems as if I've opened up a can of disagreement here.

 

Having art students 'restore' a painting by retouching and repainting a creation to bring it back to the original artists' intended design, is sad, and presumptious. There goes the historical signifigance of those works, at least in my mind and eye.

 

And retouching and rebuilding relics of old with new materials and paints, while just keeping to the original architectural design, would eventually just leave us with a structure of dimensional and design signifigance. If you want to do that, take the dimensions, and go and build a brand-spanking new one at a different site. It will probably cost even less than painstakingly deconstructing the original block-by-block and reconstructing it. And a new one at a different site will have the same historical value as rebuilding the original.

 

I think it's sacriledge. Once they're done with the Colusseum, I'll take my kid there and say "Hey, look - there's a building built by the Italians 10 years ago. It closely resembles one built by the Romans 2,000 years ago, and hey - it's actually on the same site! But it's not the same thing. Sad, sad sad."

 

I'll rather take my kid to the parthenon in Athens, which is falling to pieces with the columns lying all around, and tell him "This was built by the Greeks years ago, and is now falling apart. But THIS is IT. This is awesome..."

 

Artistic and historical pretention is simply that. It's not the real thing.

 

The historical value of a rebuilt Colusseum in Rome is exactly the same as the historical value of one built from scratch in my back yard.

[Qfwfq]

Disagreement is due to the fact that there are different aspects and some see more than others. These are mainly dividible into fitness to the purpose and constituting historic testimony. Works of art such as the Renaissance ones are very much works of craftsmanship and scholars are as much interested in the techniques employed as in what it looks like visually. The large Greek and Roman structures, like the Egyptian ones, were astonishing feats of engineering and in most of the Roman ones the cement was amazingly good (which is why I doubt the cement is being replaced more than where essential). Even when it's less stunning from such points of view, it's considered a kind of historic document, as much as the scrolls from which things may be read, and ever newer methods of investigation may glean more information about the time and place as well as of the object itself and the craftsman's technique. Therefore it isn't just the art (as we understand the word today) that is valued and the imperative is preservation in the most authentic manner possible. The trouble is: exactly what compromise is right?

 

In many cases it is wise to make excellent replicas for "fitness to the purpose" (including visual aspect) and concentrate on preservation of the original. Not practical when the original can't be moved around, but it has been done in some cases. The case of the Sistine Chapel introduces an even more subtle conundrum. Initially the nudity coverage was decided by the Council of Trent and then done according to compromise between the Renaissance-minded Vatican bishops and the more Puritan ones from north of the Alps. They agreed on a very essential coverage, but that started the ball rolling; once Michilagnolo had been violated, eventually more and more coverage was added to placate the prudish. In recent times however authenticity again prevailed and it was decided to have expert restorers remove the textile additions, so as to reveal the fine anatomical detail, but the objection was that the Counsil of Trent was an important historic event and the initial coverage therefore had its own authenticity... That's why some of the cloth is still in place.

 

A simpler example is after wartime destruction. When the Nazi were retreating, the Allies decided to bust their arses by bombing all the bridges they had to cross, including a medieval and a Roman one in Verona. The materials were then salvaged as much as possible and used for restoration, but the Roman bridge is now a rather odd combination of brick with the original stone.

[cwes99_03]

Profound, Q.

 

You are precisely right.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Whether or not to restore is in the hands of the owners and their backers.

 

I personally am much along the lines of Boer on the architectural buildings. Of course there is a limit to their age and usefulness. If they come completely down due to whatever reason (war, earthquake, whatever) then what value are they. Will you stand at the site and say once this place looked like this, holding a picture.

"I saw all the works that were done under the sun, and, look! everything was vanity and a striving after wind."

[CraigD]

And retouching and rebuilding relics of old with new materials and paints, while just keeping to the original architectural design, would eventually just leave us with a structure of dimensional and design signifigance. If you want to do that, take the dimensions, and go and build a brand-spanking new one at a different site. It will probably cost even less than painstakingly deconstructing the original block-by-block and reconstructing it. And a new one at a different site will have the same historical value as rebuilding the original.

I agree, and will take this a step further with the suggestion that the antiquities tourism industry is ripe for the introduction of augmented reality technology.

 

When I last toured Italy (2001), I was delighted by a kind of guidebook commonly sold at major ruins sites such as Rome and Pompeii, the “past and present” series printed by tipolitografica cs for Vision S.R.L. (the only way I’ve found to see an online image is to navigate the annoying printer’s flash site’s “folio”, and scroll through images for a picture of a book with the Colusseum on it). These wire-bound booklets contain modern photos of the ruins, with one or more transparent pages that can be flipped to overlay the photo to show archeologists’ and historians’ conceptions of their appearance at different periods in history.

 

IT guy that I am, I was immediately struck by the possibility of doing something like this with augmented reality (AR) technology. This technology typically involves wearing a headset and position sensor that allows a computer to overlay your normal vision with additional, “translucent” graphics. My speculation stirred pleasant fantasies about moving to Rome and making a fortune implementing just-over-the-cutting-edge technology to sell to throngs of rich-to-moderately-well-to-do tourists.

I think it's sacriledge. Once they're done with the Colusseum, I'll take my kid there and say "Hey, look - there's a building built by the Italians 10 years ago. It closely resembles one built by the Romans 2,000 years ago, and hey - it's actually on the same site! But it's not the same thing. Sad, sad sad."

The Colosseum poses some fairly unique challenges for preservationists. It’s, (well …) colossal, in something of a state of collapse, and in the middle of one the busiest parts of Rome. Though access to its interior is controlled, regular pedestrian traffic streams fairly close to its exterior. A long-standing and continuing concern is assuring that it doesn’t drop small or large chunks of ancient masonry on anybody’s head. Inside, it’s a maze of deep, formerly sub-surface passages that would be practically impossible to safely traverse without its modern system of railings and wooden walkways, including a reconstruction of the original wooden floor.

 

Demolition, reconstruction, and preservation attempts have been ongoing at the Colosseum for thousands of years, making those “sacrileges” themselves ancient history. Though it’s difficult to express, if you actually visit it, and especially if you speak with people involved in current preservation and reconstruction efforts, you are likely to be, as I was, impressed with a sense that the history of ancient monuments is not something that became frozen in time at some key point (for the Colosseum, it common to mark that point somewhere in the 6th century AD, when the last public animal hunts are thought to have been staged there), but as continuing to this day. One of the awe-inspiring qualities of ruins like these is to understand that a particular section of stone consists of stone that was scavenged from demolished 5th Century material, stone quarried in the 1st Century AD, dried brick from the 12th through 17th centuries, and fired brick from the 19th. Or that the iron work holding it together was originally bronze, and dates from anywhere from the 4th to the 21st century.

The historical value of a rebuilt Colusseum in Rome is exactly the same as the historical value of one built from scratch in my back yard.

If, at any time in its nearly 2,000 year history, more than a few centuries had passed in which people chose to allow the colosseum to decay naturally, it would have, like many ancient ruins, become a featureless heap of rubble, to be sold at material for another building. They’re be nothing for Boerseun, or anyone else, to take their kids to see.

 

Even heaps of rubble require preservation, in the form of measures to assure that they are not sold as building material, or carried away to be displayed in museums and private homes or offices. Preservationists, from medieval governors and clergy to modern day public servants, foundation staff, and academics, are in the whole more deserving of praise than derision.

[moo]

Hmmm... seems to me there's a huge difference between minor repairs over time and a total re-creation all at once.

 

Take the "wooden box handed down through generations" for example. If eventually none of the original wood is left, then perhaps some heirloom value is indeed lost - but not as much as if it were allowed to decay into oblivion. And assuming repairs take place "over the course of time" as mentioned, it remains an heirloom because the oldest planks at any given time would still be generations old.

 

However, finding the original as a decayed pile of dust and making another one of new materials (or even period materials) creates nothing but a replica.

 

Just my opinion. ;)

 

[EDIT] Point taken on the "colossalness" of the Colosseum, however it's a wee bit far gone for authentic restoration IMO. :)

 

moo

[CraigD]

The large Greek and Roman structures, like the Egyptian ones, were astonishing feats of engineering and in most of the Roman ones the cement was amazingly good (which is why I doubt the cement is being replaced more than where essential).

A lucky coincidence of my 2001 tour of Italy was that, among the dozen or so people I went with (the tour was organized by one of my former college professors, who invited mostly colleagues and former student) was an old friend of mine who’s been a masonry contractor for the past 20 or so years, and is a pretty sharp student of building technology.

 

When I commented on the amazing quality of ancient (southern) Roman masonry, he pointed out that the soft volcanic structural stone, mortar, and even much of the travertine (not marble) facing stone used in it was effectively unusable in climates with an annual freeze and thaw cycle. Had ancient Rome been built in North America, it would have been structurally unsound in decades, and nearly indistinguishable from nature in a few centuries.

 

This knowledge is of some comfort to us North Americans, who suffer from a sort of “monument envy” of Mediterraneans. While Rome has its Forum, the chronologically closest and greatest we Americans have is the Miamisburg Mound, which wasn’t even recognized as of artificial construction until the 19th century, and tends to be confused with a nearby toxic cleanup site also know as the Miamisburg Mound. It’s also comforting to modern architects and builders, who must regularly endure the commonplace notion that modern building techniques are inferior to ancient ones.

[Qfwfq]

Craig I think the Romans would have learnt soon enough not to use materials unfit for the local climate, they built a few things up north as well.

 

Take the "wooden box handed down through generations" for example. If eventually none of the original wood is left, then perhaps some heirloom value is indeed lost - but not as much as if it were allowed to decay into oblivion.

I'd say the heirloom value isn't really lost if it was the ancestors themselves taking care of it.

[Tranquility]

I think ruins should be rebuilt. No building (with the exception of follies) is ever built as a ruin, and allowing it to fall into such a condition is not a reason to preserve it in that state. Where possible, I would favour the use of original materials and techniques, but I think restoring the ruin to the original vision of its architect is more important than authenticity.

[CraigD]

Ancient vs. modern building techniques

 

Craig I think the Romans would have learnt soon enough not to use materials unfit for the local climate, they built a few things up north as well.

I agree – that’s why I qualified my previous post as referring to “ancient (southern) Roman masonry”.

 

My point was not that ancient Roman engineers were unable to understand and make allowances for local climate, but that the gentle climate of southern Italy, and, surprisingly, at different historical times, even much of costal Europe and the British Isles, are an easier place to build lasting structures than places with the literally rock-pulverizing effect of an annual freeze-thaw cycle. When faced with these conditions, even accomplished ancient builders like the Romans had to settle for buildings that might be unrecognizable earth mounds within a few centuries.

 

I’m just irked by comments I frequently hear (though not in this thread, and only rarely on hypography) ascribing supernatural or near-supernatural abilities to ancient builders. While it’s true that we moderns excel at building cheap structures capable of lasting scarcely a century, we have the capability of making even more long-lasting structures than the Egyptians, Romans, etc, even in hostile climates.

 

A remarkable feature of classical Roman buildings is that the extraordinarily long life of some of them appear to be somewhat accidental. For example, the Colossus of Nero from which the colosseum takes its name, and many structures of the same period, intended by their builders to last centuries, were “recycled” by later builders with decades, while the colosseum, which was built with the expectation of no more than a first-rate venue for spectacular entertainment, has lasted for nearly 2 millennia. Although it would later be named a holy site, made a church, and eventually preserved as a historic monument, in its inception, it was just the latest and greatest amphitheater in Rome – possibly not even the greatest, as the nearby Circus Maximus, had many times its number of seats, and enough space for everything from 1st century BC chariot racing to the 2006 World Cup.

[CraigD]

I think ruins should be rebuilt. No building (with the exception of follies) is ever built as a ruin, and allowing it to fall into such a condition is not a reason to preserve it in that state. Where possible, I would favour the use of original materials and techniques, but I think restoring the ruin to the original vision of its architect is more important than authenticity.

A problem with this approach is: to what “original” state should a ruin be rebuilt?

 

Many old structures were improved, allowed to fall into ruin and rebuilt, or built over with something completely different, etc. over centuries of history, so that now, what we think of as the “original vision” for a particular site may actually be an “improved” or even “completely different vision”.

 

As with most things historic, there’s a fundamental difficulty in understanding objects that have existed for long periods of time from a brief “snapshot” of their current state, that can only be overcome with old-fashioned study, and perhaps with neat publications and technologies like those I described in post #21.

[Turtle]

I’m just irked by comments I frequently hear (though not in this thread, and only rarely on hypography) ascribing supernatural or near-supernatural abilities to ancient builders. While it’s true that we moderns excel at building cheap structures capable of lasting scarcely a century, we have the capability of making even more long-lasting structures than the Egyptians, Romans, etc, even in hostile climates.

 

Here hear! Such claptrap as "We couldn't build the Kufu pyramid today." Then as now, it is as much a matter of money and persuasion as it is of ability. Not only as you say Craig, '...more long lasting structures...', but bigger with more open space, with fewer injuries to workers, no forced labor, etcetera.

 

Now as we have not mentioned it yet, I think the restoration question is as well about money. Does the restoration or the ruin reap more profit? Add that to restorations adding knowledge otherwise unknown, and I am for a case by case decision that does not shy from restoration when justified. :confused:

[ughaibu]

This question is known as the ship of Theseus.

http://faculty.washington.edu/smcohen/320/theseus.html

http://www.jimpryor.net/teaching/courses/intro/notes/personal-id.html

[Turtle]

This question is known as the ship of Theseus.

http://faculty.washington.edu/smcohen/320/theseus.html

http://www.jimpryor.net/teaching/courses/intro/notes/personal-id.html

 

Curious as a Cheshire cat. Thanks. :naughty: Seems to all boil down to what we mean by 'same', eh? A thing is not changed as long as it is convenient to say so, and after that not. At least no one drowned. :confused:

[Qfwfq]

I’m just irked by comments I frequently hear (though not in this thread, and only rarely on hypography) ascribing supernatural or near-supernatural abilities to ancient builders.

True, such comments are just plain silly, I was only talking about interest to historians. It's obvious that we're not unable to build as good structures today if we so chose. I do have memories of seeing one of their aqueducts still spanning a valley in quite continental parts of northern France. It's somewhere near Chaumont, I drove several times between Basel and Reims back in the '80s.

[Tranquility]

Curious as a Cheshire cat. Thanks. :) Seems to all boil down to what we mean by 'same', eh? A thing is not changed as long as it is convenient to say so, and after that not. At least no one drowned. :hyper:

 

Such an argument ignores an extremely important feature of the object, namely its semiotic significances. It is as much the name and story of a building that should be considered when judging if it is authentic.

[Turtle]

...A thing is not changed as long as it is convenient to say so, and after that not....

Such an argument ignores an extremely important feature of the object, namely its semiotic significances. It is as much the name and story of a building that should be considered when judging if it is authentic.

 

Let's see if I can convince you my statement doesn't ignore the semantics. :)

First, it contains a direct reference to semantics in the phrase 'say so', and so encourages and supports semiotic significance. As a practical example germane to the thread, we might append the terms 'rennovated' or 'restored' to the historical denomination; the 'restored Parthenon'.

'Say so' is also alluded to by the phrase, '...after that not', where the implication is '...after that not convenient to say so.' So take this to mean the history, and its vagarities, is also a consideration of a judgement of authenticity.

Well, that's all I got right now; how'd I do? :)

[Qfwfq]

It is as much the name and story of a building that should be considered when judging if it is authentic.

This goes for the heirloom.

 

Once the colosseum is regarded as a Roman relic rather than an Italian building dating back to Roman times, the authenticity is very much in the object. So many of their things were totally abandoned, then plundered for the stone, this his hardly like the heirloom being cared for by the same family line. OTOH many things, especially ones built in medieval times, remained in use with regular maintainance or even later alterations, it would make no sense to distinguish which is authentic in these cases.

 

There are churches and other buildings that date back to a century but with parts and additions of later centuries; the whole thing is historic. Some old buildings are built on foundations that were Roman. For example a couple I know have appartments in a typical Veneto building of the 17 hundreds and its foundations are all one piece with a Roman bridge that starts at its feet. Like many Roman bridges it continued to be used throughout the middle ages till today and when traffic crosses it the vibrations can be felt quite easily in the building.