The High City of Acropolis

The most famous ancient place in the Western world = The Acropolis, located on a flat rock 150m above sea level in the middle of Athens.

So what did I learn about it during our trip last week?

• The Acropolis literally means “the high city”.

• The Acropolis has been inhabited since at least the sixth millennium BC. During the late Bronze Age a Mycenaean megaron stood upon the hill, I’m not sure I’ve heard many cooler terms than that (except for one a bit later on in this entry… #staytuned)

• Even though the Acropolis is not the highest place in Athens (that’s the surprisingly unknown Mount Lycabettus, more on that in a later entry if yours truly has the OOMPH), but it was chosen in ancient history due to the fact you could get water there. Here is me on the Acropolis with Mount Lycabettus in the background.

• Btw, Mount Olympus is nowhere CLOSE to Athens.

• That Elisabeth from Athens Walks is an excellent and also very stylish tour guide (dark green eyeliner, dark green earrings, dark green hairtie, “I knew you’d comment on her style,” Ilmari said gleefully when I mentioned it the moment the tour ended.). We listened to her commentaries through our stylish yellow earphones and it worked excellent.

• There is a lot more to the Acropolis than just the top of the rock. Our tour took us gradually upwards, passing many momentous historical sites.

• On the way to the top you can see the Dionysos Theatre (Θέατρο του Διονύσου Ελευθερέως), constructed in the 4th century BC, considered the oldest theatre. It was used to celebrate the great Greek god Dionysos, god of wine and theatre. Its golden age was in the 5th century.

• Apparently the rectangular bits at the upper right were where the prizes went… or the winners?

• On the way to the top it would also be hard to miss the magnificent Odeon of Herodes Atticus (Ωδείο Ηρώδου του Αττικού), which he built in memoriam of his wife who died at 35 or something. Herodes evidently decided his wife’s name was not cool enough (“Regilla”) to be in the name of a funky Odeon, so he solved this predicament by naming it after himself. The Odeon is still used for some music shows. I remember the names Coldplay, Florence and the Machine, and famous Greek singer Maria Kallas.

• The Acropolis cat, 13 years old, is always there. This was what I understood according to Elisabeth our tour guide though; now when I googled “Acropolis Cat” it came up with a famous fat ginger cat who has its own Google Maps Pin as “Chonkus Megalos”, hailed as the biggest cat they’ve ever seen. Apparently the animal welfare people who care for stray cats call him “Fatty”. But so this Acropolis cat in my pic is not Chonkus Megalos but the Acropolis cat.

• Once you get to the top of the Acropolis, past the theatres and felines, there are many things to see. Pericles (around 495-429BC) organised the construction of the most important ones: the Parthenon, the Propylaea, the Erechtheion, and the Temple of Athena Nike.

• The Propylaea is the funky gateway. It had five gates in olden (very olden) times.

• The Parthenon, the biggest and most famous temple on the Acropolis, was built for the goddess Athena. In olden times the Parthenon housed a ginormous golden statue of her. It disappeared.

• “Parthenon” most likely comes from the Greek word “parthénos (παρθένος)”, meaning maiden or virgin. Not a hugely innovative connotation perhaps, but let’s let them be without too much judgment, as this was literally years pre-Christ.  

• The damage sustained by the Parthenon is not all a romantic sign of ancientness, the natural wearing away of bygone human construction during the inevitable trundle of what we call Time. No, this was from a 1687 siege by the Venetians during the Morean War, lols. I say bittersweetly. (Though I don’t think we can blame the Venetians fully, either, since the reason it blew up so bad was coz the (Turkish) rulers of that time had decided the Parthenon would be an excellent gunpowder stash.)

• Greeks knew their mathematical lines. For example, the Parthenon (amongst other temples) was constructed with columns becoming gradually smaller the higher you get. Because of this, when you look up at the massive structure, it doesn’t look as if it were falling upon you.

• Hmmm okay I can’t think of a way to create a space between images without text in between. Well, here is a pic of us.

• The main area of the top of the Acropolis is paved with a flat surface. That is not from ancient times, it is for accessibility in modern times. However, due to whatever archeological laws, the flat surface is covered with little exciting pot holes depicting the original surface.

• The Caryatids at the Erechtheion temple, statues of six women in long gowns holding up the temple, are fascinating. (As is the habit I never remember the exact names of things, often Google corrects it for me, but when I googled, from memory, “cariotid erechtryon”, Google wanted to correct it to “carotid erection”, which refers to carotid intima-media thickness which can lead to erectile disfynction, #youneverstoplearning).

• Built in the fifth century BC, the six Caryatids you see in front of their temple are replicas, while in reality one of them was destroyed by a Turkish cannonball, whereas one is on show at the British Museum, ending up there due to the questionable actions of Lord Elgin (when his boat carrying remnants from the Acropolis sank to the bottom of the sea and divers went digging them up, he described them as “stones of no value” to make sure he could take them all the way to the UK, **if a frown could tut**).

• And here they are up close.

• The original Caryatids are on show in the Acropolis museum. Note the destruction of one and the non-existence of the other.

• Btw, the top floor of the Acropolis museum (opened in 2009, that odd-looking modern grey building) is built askew not due to lazy architects, but to reflect the exact angle of the Acropolis. This picture is of the Acropolis museum taken from the Acropolis.

• And here is the Acropolis from the Acropolis museum.

• Also, museum fun fact – the construction of the Acropolis museum was delayed due to the fact that while they were constructing it they discovered ancient ruins of an ancient town. #onlyinathens They’ve made use of it now by opening the Museum of Excavation underneath the Acropolis museum, accessible free of charge with an Acropolis museum ticket.

• Okay, back to the top of the Acropolis itself.

• Once upon a time, upon the Acropolis, there was a power struggle between Poseidon and Athena. Poseidon struck ground, salt water came out, wow. Not the most marvellous thing for people, as tis difficult to drink. Athena, on the other hand, planted the first ever olive tree (which we saw, though yes a descendant of it), so, well, guess who Greece named its capital after.

• Oh and btw fun fact Athena was born by erupting fully-grown out of her father’s head. He had been suffering from mysterious horrific headaches ever since eating his pregnant wife some years previously.

• The reason there aren’t many high buildings in Athens are coz the law says you cannot cover the view of the Acropolis.

• Can you spot familiar landmarks?

• Oh and you remember Athena’s dad? That’s his temple in the foreground.

• There are three types of columns: Doric (simple style), Ionic (moderate squiggles), Corinthian (elaborate squiggle central). The Parthenon is Doric.

• Embarrassingly enough, I learnt that Nike was not just a sports brand from the States, but a Greek Goddess. And that Nike’s logo took its inspiration of the winged Athena Nike, viewing her from the side. Athena Nike, has a temple on the Acropolis too, right on the side.

• This is the Ancient Agora in the foreground (well, behind the #tourists).

• And this is truly a rock that Paul from the New Testament preached on. Wow. We eventually skipped visiting it as the downpours had just started.

• Even before the rain, February in Greece can necessitate Finnish winter-style fuzzy mittens.

• And even when it’s overcast February about to chuck it down with rain, the Acropolis is crowded. Just as our tour ended, it started raining, and we escaped back through the five-entranced Propylaea, eventually ending up at the museum.

I wonder at what point in a building’s lifespan you go from being an old useless heap of stone to a revered worldwide historic tourist attraction.

Emzy xxx