Day one; Wednesday 9th September. The Acropolis and ancient Agora

Lunchtime

It’s a bit eccentric, really, saying that I am planning to retrace some of the steps of Pausanias, when I simply cannot envisage a stay in Athens that doesn’t begin with the Acropolis.  About which he says relatively little (and next-to-nothing about the Parthenon). 

I’ve spent just over two hours up there today, and am now relaxing at the Klepsydra Café in Plaka, after eating a big plate of salad and some tzatsiki.  I’m hot and tired.

Photos to follow, when I get back to the hotel and get my uploading cable.

I started off this morning by heading to Mitropolis Square.  I’d had a plan to light a candle in the church of the Panagia Gorgoepikoos, aka the Old Mitropolis, but it was shut.  So I contented myself with wandering round the exterior admiring all the bits of decorative Classical and Byzantine masonry built into the walls.  It’s a beautiful little church and the effect of the random carvings is charmingly weird.  I imagine the builders’ delight as they snaffled things up at some kind of mediaeval stone-recycling centre; Ooh, yeah, I’ll have those rosettes and the one with birds on it, and that lion, and that nice bit of architrave, thanks, mate, how much is that?   There’s a relief showing torches and poppy-seed heads that surely has to have come from somewhere connected to the Eleusinian Mysteries, and there are several inscriptions.  I managed to decipher the words “to Herakles” on one; so that’s certainly not Christian, then...  They added crosses to Christianise things, but otherwise took a lot of care to use the bits they’d got in a logical way, with matching pieces placed symmetrically and parts reused in suitable places; so lintels as lintels, and so on.  I sat on a wall by the church for a while, in the shade, watching people passing to and fro across the square, and the first leaves falling from the plane trees. 

The modern Cathedral next door is under restoration and covered in scaffolding at the moment. I can’t say I mind much; it’s big and four-square and dressy, and rather unattractive compared to the golden-hued marble and delicate nuttiness of the Old Mitropolis.   Our Lady Who Brings Help Swiftly.

Then I had coffee.  The soul says “Give me beautiful churches, archaeological sites, picturesque historic streets!” but the needs of the body have to be met, too, and the body was saying “I didn’t sleep terribly well and I want coffee!”  The terrace of the Café Metropol was half-empty at 10.00am, me and a few more tourists, a couple of elderly Greek gentlemen playing cards, and two young priests having baklava and cappuccinos... 

Then I walked through the flea market streets, admiring lovely things for sale (I have not come to go shopping! – but if I had, oh, the leatherwork, the ceramics, the jewellery!).  I discovered that the Library of Hadrian is open to visitors these days, which I hadn’t known; but decided to leave that for tomorrow.  I could see the rock of the Acropolis ahead of me against the sky and I really wanted to get up there before the morning got too hot.

It’s hard not to get distracted in Athens, though.  Not only is there history at every turn, but a rather handsome shield bug had decided to take a ride on my blouse, and had to be rescued and rehomed in a bush.  There was baby-blue plumbago in flower everywhere, and in Monastiraki there were stalls selling beautiful mounds of grapes and purple plums.  There are disused houses falling to bits, picturesque but heart-breaking, and others being patched-up and done-up by hefting sweating men with ladders and concrete mixers and big dangerous-looking tools.  There are lanky long-bodied cats sleeping in doorways (& waking suddenly and running away when I try to photograph them).  There are sudden glimpses across the Agora towards the Hephaistion, when the trees hide most of the rest of the view and for a moment it almost looks as though Athens is still just a country town with some rather nice ruins.  There are the cicadas singing madly everywhere.

There was the moment when I realised I was walking on the ancient Panathenaic Way; actually on the stones of the Classical road surface.   Complete with wheel-ruts, worn away over 2000 years ago.

A few minutes after that I stopped to watch some pigeons feeding in the lee of a big rock with a dark hollow under it.  There was no-one else on the path and the shade under the pines was deep and resin-scented.  It felt still and idyllic, another of those moments when everything seems unchanged for centuries.  Then I realised that this rock I was staring at was in fact the north side of the Areopagus; so very likely the semi-cave I was looking at could be the shrine of the Eumenides, the cave sanctuary into which they descend at the end of the Oresteia.  Stand, citizens, and be silent, while the Kindly Ones pass... 

Sometimes a classical education is a mixed blessing.  The sense of time telescoping was jarring, and almost chilling for a moment, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.  It does not do, even now, to take the Eumenides lightly.

A few minutes later I was back in the sun, though, and queuing for my ticket to the Acropolis.  And then I was heading up the slope, in a long stream of tourists of many nationalities, towards the columns of the Propylaia, and the moment when you step through the entry-way and see the profile of the open rock before you, and the great temples.

There’s still a lot of restoration work going on, just as there was last time I was here; but some areas are finished.  Last time I was in Athens must be twenty years ago now; the little Temple of Nike was smothered in scaffolding then.  Now that’s standing proud on its bastion, shining clean and looking wonderful.  On parts of the Propylaia the work is finished, so one can look up now at the magnificent coffered ceiling on the north side, and some beautiful replacement Ionic capitals; and the Erechtheum is scaffolding-free, too.  The eastern end of the Parthenon on the other hand is still almost completely covered in scaffolding and cranes, and it’s fenced all along the south side as well. 

Well, better they take as long as it needs, and do the job well.  The western end and the north side are looking really good now.  Eventually it will all look like that.  It’s worth the time and effort, to conserve something this famous, this admired, this iconic.

There’s a real sense of pilgrimage, approaching the Parthenon; that stream of people feels very like a pilgrim procession, and it’s clear that this is the main goal of the visitors.  We aren’t just coming to see an ancient and famous building in ruins, we aren’t just coming to learn about history and speculate on what it must have been like in its prime.  We’re coming because of all the generations of people who have come before us, and all the dozens, hundreds, possibly thousands of meanings and interpretations and nuances that they’ve laid on it.  We’re coming because it’s iconic; and it’s iconic because those centuries of fame have made it so.  So we’re participating in a kind of endless reconsecration of the beloved sacred place.

It may be heresy, incidentally, but I think the Erechtheum is the more beautiful building.  Like the Old Mitropolis, it’s a bit crazy-looking, yet within the strange structure imposed upon it by having to include three separate sacred sites, it’s graceful and even delicate to look at, with exquisite carvings and slender Ionic columns.  Just like the Parthenon, it went through several changes of use over the centuries, and not all of those uses were holy by any means.  Yet there’s a tangible sense of continuity, of the persistence of sanctity, here.  There’s even an olive tree planted just outside, on the site where the sacred olive of Athena once grew. 

I’d never thought before of what a piece of theatre it all was.  The Erechtheum was the really sacred place, where the ancient statue of Athena Polias, the patroness of the city, was kept.  As you came in through the Propylaia, 2500 years ago, there would have been a wall on your right and then the arcades of the precinct of Artemis; the Parthenon was almost downplayed, one wouldn’t have seen it full-face at first.  But dead ahead, directly in front of you, surrounded by votive offerings, was the 9-metre-tall bronze statue of Athena of the Vanguard; and directly behind her you would have seen the sacred olive tree, and the Erechtheum, the Goddess’ house in Athens.

Then you would have processed up the slope, through the thicket of dedications, statues and inscriptions and so on (the surface of the rock is pitted with cuttings for statue bases and inscribed stelae).  And slowly the huge showstopper that is the Parthenon would have been unveiled to you.  You would have walked its entire length, column after measured, golden column, and finally turned at the eastern end to see the great sculpted pediment of the birth of the Goddess, and within, the distant gleam of her gold and ivory cult statue.

The whole thing is just layer upon layer of emphasis; saying to the pilgrim arriving “This is our Goddess; our patroness, our protector.  She owns this city, she fought to win it and we are her favourites.  Here she dwells, here is the place she has blessed with her supreme gifts.  Everything you see around you demonstrates the benefits of living in a city favoured by the goddess of strategy, wisdom, cunning and foresight, and skill in craft...”

Oof, I’m very full of food now, which is probably why I’m waxing lyrical like this.  Much refreshed by several large glasses of cold water as well; they just kept bringing out fresh carafes to every table.  What a nice café this is.  I should pay and go, though.  Next stop, the Agora.

Later: Wednesday evening.

I had another wonderful mooch all afternoon, and then sat under a tree sketching the view towards the north face of the Acropolis from the slope below the temple of Hephaistos.  The Ancient Agora is fascinating and confusing in equal measures.  It’s much less crowded than the Acropolis.  It’s full of trees, and wildflowers, and birds (I even met a tortoise, stumping along purposefully through the undergrowth near the Altar of the 12 Gods).  The museum in the restored Stoa of Attaos is packed with amazing finds from the site; broken statuary of every kind from superb to endearingly bad, hobnails from the cobbler’s workshop, stunning red-figure drinking cups, oil lamps, cooking utensils, even ostraka scratched with some very famous names that someone or other wanted banished, 2 ½ thousand years ago...

I was pretty worn out by the time I left at 7.00pm, though.  But a shower and a good supper later, I feel human again; and I’ve managed to get the air-conditioning in my room working.  That's brought the temperature down to about 27 degrees, and it feels quite cool.  I should be much more able to get a good night’s sleep now.

I’ve been drinking plenty of water all day, though, and I don’t feel any the worse for the heat. 

Okay, time for bed.  Photos tomorrow, maybe...  I need to recharge my camera before I can upload them, anyway; I ran it right down to the red zone today.  And will undoubtedly do so again tomorrow.