Carly and Zeus / Alec and Ceramics / Kathryn and Benaki

I am so enjoying accompanying students on their site visits!  Here is the Temple of Olympian Zeus with Carly:

Collossal column with the Acropolis, Arch of Hadrian and modern buildings all in one shot.

This little gem is squished in between two modern concrete blocks.



My travellers would see this as a symbol of the mortality of all civilizations... it fell during a terrific storm in the 1850s... survived nearly 2000 years to be toppled by wind...

Next I went to the Ceramics Museum in a surviving mosque in Monastiraki with Alec.  The mosque was saved by a scholar who wanted to use it as a folk museum, thus reclaiming it as a Greek monument...Both the building and its contents were fascinating:

Surviving fresco inside the former mosque.

Folk Art with capital letters  not everyday used objects, but art by named artists working in "folk" styles

That was yesterday.  Today I went to the Benaki Museum with Kathryn.  It is the only museum I've been to in Greece that gives equal time to ancient, Byzantine and "modern" (19th-20th century) material culture.  The museum is organized chronologically from the neolithic period to the modern day, except for the "War of Independence" exhibit at the top above the cafe...

Musical instruments from the 19th century

Lord Byron's own pistols

Byron's own writing desk