At the turn of the 19th century, Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin had the Parthenon marbles hacked out of the ancient temple in Ottoman-occupied Athens, removing half of its sculptural decoration and causing irreversible damage to the building’s structure. In 1816, deep in debt, he sold the marbles to the British government, which subsequently entrusted them to the British Museum. Almost half a century later, in another country, his son, James Bruce, 8th Earl of Elgin, ordered the destruction of the Old Summer Palace in Beijing during the Second Opium War. This resulted in countless artefacts being dispersed across collections around the world. Today, the question is asked: what can be done to help this cultural heritage find its way home?

About the Speaker:

Catharine Titi, Dr iur., is an international lawyer and tenured Research Associate Professor at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS)–CERSA, Paris-Panthéon-Assas University, France. In addition to being a member of the Scientific Committee of the UNESCO Chair on Threats to Cultural Heritage and Cultural Heritage-related Activities, Catharine sits on the Academic Council of the Institute for Transnational Arbitration (ITA) of the Center for American and International Law (CAIL), on the panel of arbitrators of the Court of Arbitration for Art (CAfA), and she is appointed to the roster of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement’s (USMCA) Annex 31-B panellists. She has formerly served as Co-Chair of the Academic Forum on ISDS, whose work contributes to the discussions in Working Group III of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL WG III) and on the Board of the European Society of International Law (ESIL). She holds a PhD from the University of Siegen in Germany (summa cum laude, Rolf H. Brunswig PhD Prize) and she has previously been a consultant at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). In 2016, Catharine was awarded the prestigious Smit-Lowenfeld Prize of the International Arbitration Club of New York for the best article published in the field of international arbitration. Catharine’s working languages are English, French, Greek, and Spanish. She is author of The Right to Regulate in International Investment Law (Nomos and Hart Publishing 2014), The Function of Equity in International Law (Oxford University Press 2021), and The Parthenon Marbles and International Law (Springer 2023), and co-author of the Spanish nonfiction book Arte secuestrado (Abducted Art) (Península 2026). For more information, visit https://catharinetiti.com.

Register here to attend the seminar on or before 8 October 2026, 12:00 noon (HKT).

*CPD credits are available upon application and subject to accreditation by the Law Society of Hong Kong (currently pending).