Avernus

(Transcribed from notebook)

Why is it more tiring to walk round museums than to treck long distances round the city? My feet ache. >.<

Today we started with visiting the temple of Olympian Zeus, which was bloody impressive in an ostentatious Roman kinda way - only the columns of the C2nd AD temple are still standing, not the older Greek temples at all. The colums themselves are *enormous* though - towering great Corinthian monstrosities 17.25m high. Pretty damn alarming.

Most of the rest of the day has been devoted to assorted random museums. The National Archaeological Museum is closed at the moment (*curses*), so we looked at some of the smaller and less well-known ones - the Benaki museum, which is rather random stuff from pre-history right through to the present day, and the Cycladic Art Museum, which is about the culture and artifacts of the Cycladic islands from 3000 - 2000BC.

So, first the Benaki. Being a Classicist I was far more interested in the early stuff than the modern (of course, when I say 'modern' I mean 'anything in the last 1500 years'). There were some beautiful artifacts from about 2000 - 1000BC, and a fascinating section on th development of pottery and decorative arts from the pre-Minoan cultures through to the Classical period. Well, it's fascinating if you're me. Katy, they had a couple of pots that looks a *lot* like black-topped redware ^_^ The later stuff included a lot of icons, and galleries and galleries of historic costume. A very odd collection, but it makes for quite a fun museum.

We then moved on to the Cycladic museum, caught a bite of rather nice lunch at the cafe, then went on to look at the exhibitions. Apparently the Cyclades islands had a thriving and innovative culture about the same time as the great Minoan culture was flourishing on Crete, 3000-1000BC. There have been some *amazing* finds from the islands, largely carved from the marble which occurs naturally there. There are some beautifully graceful and elegantly worked cups, bowls, and so on. The most notable artifacts are the largely female figurines, ranging in size from about 3 inches to about 1m in height, usually found in graves. They're incredibly modern looking, all impressionistic outlines and rounded forms. They're beautiful, in a strange sort of way. If you're ever in Athens, check it out.

(There were also some Classical pottery pieces, the usual red and black figure ware, but only one smutty one that I could see ^_^)

Then we wandered back to the hotel through the Plaka, glancing through the tourist-trap shops. I just wish they didn't all station people outside to pounce on you if you so much as slow down. It's damned unnerving. Does it unnerve all English people or just my family? Ugh.