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Area: 428 sq km
Population: 3.27 million
Time Zone: GMT/UTC +2 (Eastern European Time)
Telephone Area Code: 21
For most visitors the highlight of a visit to ATHENS (Athína
in modern Greek) is the stunning vestiges of the ancient, Classical Greek city,
most famously represented by the Acropolis and its surrounding archeological
sites. Even on a brief visit, however, it is a shame to see Athens purely as the
location of ancient sites and museums.
The old nineteenth-century quarter of Pláka, in particular, is
a delight, with its mix of Turkish, Neoclassical and Greek-island architecture,
and an array of intriguing little museums devoted to traditional arts, ceramics
and music. Just to its north, the bazaar area, around Athinás and Eólou, retains
an almost Middle Eastern atmosphere in its life and trade, while the National
Gardens, elegant Kolonáki and the hill of Lykavitós offer respite from the
maelstrom. Further afield, but still well within the limits of Greater Athens,
are the monasteries of Kessarianí and Dhafní, the latter with Byzantine mosaics
the equal of any in Greece.
Athens is an affable city enlivened by outdoor cafes, pedestrian streets, parks,
gardens and urban eccentrics. It is a curious blend of east and west; its
raucous street vendors and colourful markets are reminiscent of Turkish bazaars,
while crumbling neoclassical mansions hark back to the city's brief heyday as
the 'Paris of the Mediterranean'.
Orientation
The city is bounded on three sides by Mt Parnitha, Mt Pendeli and Mt Hymettos.
Within Athens there are no less than eight hills, of which the Acropolis and
Lykavittos are the most prominent. The hills provide a peaceful respite from the
clamour of the city, and offer stunning views to the glistening waters of the
Saronic Gulf, the city's boundary on the south side. The streets of Athens
(clearly signposted in Greek and English) now meld imperceptibly into Piraeus,
the city's port.
Just about everything of interest to the traveller is within a small area
surrounding Plateia Syntagmatos (Syntagma Square). This area is bounded by the
districts of Plaka to the south, Monastiraki to the west, Kolonaki to the east
and Omonia to the north.
Plateia Syntagmatos is dominated by the old Royal Palace and is the beating
heart of the business district, with luxury hotels, banks and airline offices.
Plaka, nestled below the Acropolis, is the old Turkish quarter and virtually all
that existed when Athens was declared the capital of independent Greece. Though
Plaka is packed with tourists in high season, it's also one of the prettiest and
most atmospheric areas of the city. Monastiraki is the market district and a
fascinating part of town to wander. Psiri, nearby, is brimming with stylish
cafes and bars and makes a great place to stop for a spot of lunch. Kolonaki, a
classy residential area tucked in under Lykavittos Hill, is full of trendy
boutiques, art galleries and cafes. Omonia, a grimy zone known for its
pickpockets and prostitutes, is an important transport hub, especially for
buses. - Lonely PlanetTravel Guide
The main landmark of Athens is the acropolis (412 ft/126 m high), which
dominates the city and on which stand the remains of the Parthenon, the
propylaea, and the Erechtheum. Occupying the southern part of Athens, the
Acropolis is ringed by the other chief landmarks of the ancient city—the Pnyx,
where the citizens’ assemblies were held; the Areopagus; the Theseum of
Hephaesteum, a well-preserved Doric temple of the 5th cent. B.C.; the old Agora
and the Roman forum; the temple of Zeus or Olympieum (begun under Pisistratus in
the 6th cent. B.C. and completed in the 2d cent. A.D. under Hadrian, whose arch
stands nearby); the theatre of Dionysius (the oldest in Greece); and the Odeum
of Herodes Atticus.
There are many Roman remains in the “new” quarter, built east
of the original city walls by Emperor Hadrian (1st cent. A.D.); there the modern
royal palace and gardens also stand. The stadium is E of the Ilissus River.
Parts of the ancient city walls are still visible, particularly at the Dipylon,
the sacred gate on the road to Eleusis; however, the Long Walls connecting
Athens and Piraiévs have almost entirely disappeared. The most noteworthy
Byzantine structures are the churches of St. Theodora and of the Holy Apostles,
both built in the 12th cent. Athens is the see of an archbishop who presides
over the Synod of the Greek Orthodox Church. The city is the seat of the
National and Capodistrian Univ. (1837), a polytechnic institute, an academy of
sciences, several schools of archaeology, and many museums and libraries. A
nuclear research center is nearby, at Aghia Paraskevi.
History
The cultural legacy of ancient Athens to the world is incalculable; to a great
extent the references to the Greek heritage that abound in the culture of
Western Europe are to Athenian civilization. Athens, named after its patron
goddess Athena, was inhabited in the Bronze Age. Its citizens later proudly
claimed that their ancestors had lived in the city even before the settlements
of Attica were molded into a single state (according to legend, by Theseus). 4
Early History
According to tradition, Athens was governed until c.1000 B.C. by Ionian kings,
who had gained suzerainty over all Attica. After the Ionian kings Athens was
rigidly governed by its aristocrats through the archontate (see archons), until
Solon began to enact liberal reforms in 594 B.C. Solon abolished serfdom,
modified the harsh laws attributed to Draco (who had governed Athens c.621
B.C.), and altered the economy and constitution to give power to all the
propertied classes, thus establishing a limited democracy. His economic reforms
were largely retained when Athens came under (560–511 B.C.) the rule of the
tyrant Pisistratus and his sons Hippias and Hipparchus. During this period the
city’s economy boomed and its culture flourished. Building on the system of
Solon, Cleisthenes then established (c.506 B.C.) a democracy for the freemen of
Athens, and the city remained a democracy during most of the years of its
greatness.
A Great City-State
The Persian Wars (500–449 B.C.) made Athens the strongest Greek city-state. Much
smaller and less powerful than Sparta at the start of the wars, Athens was more
active and more effective in the fighting against Persia. The Athenian heroes
Miltiades, Themistocles, and Cimon were largely responsible for building the
city’s strength. In 490 B.C. the Greek army defeated Persia at Marathon. A great
Athenian fleet won a major victory over the Persians off the island of Salamis
(480 B.C.). The powerful fleet also enabled Athens to gain hegemony in the
Delian League, which was created in 478–477 B.C. through the confederation of
many city-states; in succeeding years the league was transformed into an empire
headed by Athens. The city arranged peace with Persia in 449 B.C. and with its
chief rival, Sparta, in 445 B.C., but warfare with smaller Greek cities
continued.
During the time of Pericles (443–429 B.C.) Athens reached the height of its
cultural and imperial achievement; Socrates and the dramatists Aeschylus,
Sophocles, and Euripides were active. The incomparable Parthenon was built, and
sculpture and painting flourished. Athens became a center of intellectual life.
However, the rivalry with Sparta had not ended, and in 431 B.C. the
Peloponnesian War between Sparta and Athens began.
The war went badly for Athens from the start. The Long Walls
built to protect the city and its port of Piraiévs saved the city itself as long
as the fleet was paramount, but the allies of Athens fell away and the land
empire Pericles had tried to build already had crumbled before his death in 429
B.C. The war dragged on under the leadership of Cleon and continued even after
the collapse of the expedition against Sicily, urged (415 B.C.) by Alcibiades.
The Peloponnesian War finally ended in 404 B.C. with Athens completely humbled,
its population cut in half, and its fleet reduced to a dozen ships.
Under the dictates of Sparta, Athens was compelled to tear
down the Long Walls and to accept the government of an oligarchy called the
Thirty Tyrants. However, the city recovered rapidly. In 403 B.C. the Thirty
Tyrants were overthrown by Thrasybulus, and by 376 B.C. Athens again had a
fleet, had rebuilt the Long Walls, had re-created the Delian League, and had won
a naval victory over Sparta. Sparta also lost power as a result of its defeat
(371 B.C.) by Thebes at Leuctra; and, although Athens did not again achieve
hegemony over Greece, it did have a short period of great prosperity and
comfort.
The Decline of Athens
The growth of Macedon’s power under Philip II heralded the demise of Athens as a
major power. Despite the pleas by Demosthenes to the citizens of Athens to stand
up against Macedon, Athens was decisively defeated by Philip at Chaeronea in 338
B.C. The city did not dare dispute the mastery of Philip’s son and successor,
Alexander the Great. After his death Athens revolted (323–322 B.C.) against
control by Macedon, but the revolt was quashed, and Athens lost its remaining
dependencies and declined into a provincial city. Its last bid for greatness
(266–262 B.C.) was firmly suppressed by Antigonus II, king of Macedon.
Through the troubled times of the Peloponnesian War and the
wars against Philip, Athenian achievements in philosophy, drama, and art had
continued. Aristophanes wrote comedies, Plato taught at the Academy, Aristotle
compiled an incredible store of information, and Thucydides wrote a great
history of the Peloponnesian War. As the city’s glory waned in the 3d cent.
B.C., its earlier contributions were spread over the world in Hellenistic
culture.
Athens became a minor ally of growing Rome, and a period of
stagnation was broken only when the city unwisely chose to support Mithradates
VI of Pontus against Rome. As a result, Athens was sacked by the Roman general
Sulla in 86 B.C. Nevertheless, Athens sent out many teachers to Rome and
retained a certain faded glory as a moderately prosperous small city in the
backwash of the empire. It remained so until the time when the Eastern Empire
began to fall to the barbarians. Athens was captured in A.D. 395 by the
Visigoths under Alaric I.
From Byzantine to Ottoman Rule
Athens became a provincial capital of the Byzantine Empire and a center of
religious learning and devotion. Following the creation (1204) of the Latin
Empire of Constantinople (see Constantinople, Latin Empire of), Athens passed
(1205) to Othon de la Roche, a French nobleman from Franche-Comté, who was made
megaskyr [great lord] of Athens and Thebes. His nephew and successor, Guy I,
obtained the ducal title, and the duchy of Athens, under Guy I and his
successors, enjoyed great prosperity while becoming thoroughly French in its
institutions. In 1311 the duchy was captured by a band of Catalan
soldier-adventurers who offered (1312) the ducal title to King Frederick II of
Sicily, a member of the house of Aragón. Members of the house of Aragón carried
the title, but Athens was in fact governed by the “Catalan Grand Company,” which
also acquired (1318) the neighboring duchy of Neopatras.
The French feudal culture disappeared, and Athens sank into
insignificance and poverty, particularly after 1377, when the succession was
contested in civil war. Peter IV of Aragón assumed sovereignty in 1381 but ruled
from Barcelona. On his initiative, the devastated duchy was settled by
Albanians. Athens again prospered briefly after its conquest in 1388 by Nerio I
Acciajuoli, lord of Corinth, a Florentine noble. Under the Acciajuoli family’s
rule numerous Florentine merchants established themselves in Athens. However,
the fall of the Acropolis to the Ottoman Turks in 1458 marked the beginning of
nearly four centuries of Ottoman rule, and Athens once more declined. Venice,
which had held Athens from 1394 to 1402, recovered it briefly from the Turks in
1466 and besieged it in 1687–88. During the siege the Parthenon, used by the
Turks as a powder magazine, was largely blown up in a bombardment.
Modern Athens
Modern Athens was constructed only after 1834, when it became the capital of a
newly independent Greece. Otto I, first king of the Hellenes (1832–62), rebuilt
much of the city, and the first modern Olympic games were held there in 1896.
The population grew rapidly in the 1920s, when Greek refugees arrived from
Turkey. The city’s inhabitants suffered extreme hardships during the German
occupation (1941–44) in World War II, but the city escaped damage in the war and
in the country’s civil troubles of 1944–50.
The 1950s and 60s brought unbridled expansion. Land clearance
for suburban building caused runoff and flooding, requiring the modernization of
the sewer system. The Mornos River was dammed and a pipeline over 100 mi (160
km) long was built to Athens, supplementing the inadequate water supply. The
development of a highway system facilitated the proliferation of automobiles,
resulting in increased air pollution. This accelerated the deterioration of
ancient buildings and monuments, requiring preservation and conservation
programs as well as traffic bans in parts of the city. The Ellinikon airport was
modernized and enlarged to accommodate increased tourism. A strong earthquake
jolted the city in 1999, and in 2004 the summer Olympic games were held there
again.
Bibliography
The Greek geographer Pausanias wrote an extensive description of ancient Greece.
Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, and Polybius were great Greek historians.
Modern general works on ancient Greece include those of J. B. Bury and Michael
Rostovtzeff. See also A. H. M. Jones, Athenian Democracy (1957, repr. 1986); J.
C. Hill, The Ancient City of Athens, Its Topography and Monuments (rev. ed.
1969); C. M. Bowra, Periclean Athens (1971); R. Meiggs, The Athenian Empire
(1972); W. S. Ferguson, Hellenistic Athens (1986); D. Kagan, The Fall of the
Athenian Empire (1987); M. H. Hansen, The Athenian Democracy in the Age of
Demosthenes (tr. 1999). See also bibliography under Greece. 17
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Sources: The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition,
Columbia University Press.; Lonely Planet; Frommers Guide
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