Introduction

Archaeology constantly deals with so-called “facts.” Public opinion clearly associates the field with demonstrable facts. Since the object of archaeology is investigating the past by analysing material phenomena, the discipline is expected to have something substantial to say about the “travel” – meaning in this case the historical continuity – of such “facts.” The existence of ancient civilizations with their apparent immutability has generated confidence in the existence of cultural and artistic continuity, or at least of a gradual development that transmits facts through time. The numerous modern revivals of ancient forms and ideas, both in scholarship as well as in the broader context, have seemed evidence for the existence of a “cultural memory” within which facts might comfortably travel through time.

This article examines this widely held popular assumption. I suggest that the answer to the question of what travels and how largely depends on the interest and focus of the beholder rather than on the phenomena beheld. Seen in this light, both classical revivals in art and architecture and the academic investigation of ancient Greek culture turn out to be creative undertakings that mould and even invent the shape and meaning of the past. The material with which I will illustrate this is Greek-inspired American architecture of the nineteenth century and the public response to this phenomenon.