Rick Steves Athens & The Heart of Greece
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Delphi Day 3
Our tour hits the road today, we are off to Delphi! Our bus seats 50 people, but there's only 23 of us, so there's plenty of room to spread out!! The time goes by quickly; Apostolos keeps our attention with facts about Greece and we have a stop along the way for a morning coffee and snacks.
Mt Parnassus is off in the distance, as it gets closer and closer, you realize how tall the mountains are in Greece. We stop at the small mountain town of Arachova for a quick lunch on our own. A beautiful village, Arachova is close to Delphi and is also a favorite destination for some of the best skiing in Greece.
Not long after having lunch in Arachova, we arrived at our hotel in Delphi, the Hotel Leto. The streets are very narrow in the town, so we end up blocking the road with our bus while we unload! We have a little time to explore before walking down to the archaeological site and museum. We can see all the way to the Gulf of Corinth. The wide valley is full of olive trees - over a MILLION of them!! The oldest, continuous olive grove in Greece.
It's all so very Greek!
I've forgotten many details concerning Greek mythology, so I had to ask "Who was LETO?" It turns out that Leto was the mother of the twin gods Apollo and Artemis (fathered by Zeus, who else? ) When Leto was pregnant with the twins she was pursued relentlessly by the jealous goddess Hera, wife of Zeus. Hera drove Leto out of Olympus, and no one would give Leto a place to give birth because they didn't want to upset Hera. Finally, Leto came upon the floating island of Delos. She gave birth to Artemis first, then 9 days later, Apollo was born.
The Delphi Archaeological Museum sits next to the site of Delphi. There are so MANY cool things in this museum! Thankfully, we have Penny to guide us through these treasures.
Museum highlights
The Sphinx of Naxos 560 BC
The body of a lion with the head of a woman and wings of a bird. It was dedicated by the Islanders of Naxos and served as a guardian of the Sanctuary.
With Penny standing next to it, you can see how big it is, let alone standing on top of a 30 foot tall Ionic column.
(pardon the sunlight shining on its face)
The Pediment and Frieze from the east side of the Siphnian Treasury 530 BC.
This is what would be facing you as you walked up the Sacred Way to Apollo's Temple. In the very middle of the pediment (the pointy top part) is Heracles (right) trying to steal the oracle tripod from Apollo (left) and Zeus has to step in between them. Artemis is holding onto Apollo.
On the frieze (below the pediment), there are two parts: on the right side is a scene from Homer's Iliad, the Trojan war, on the left are the gods and goddesses on Mt Olympus, and they are deciding the fate of the war. Those sitting on the left are siding with the Trojans, and the gods on the right are siding with the Greeks. It's all so very fascinating!!
The North Frieze of the Siphnian Treasury.
The north frieze depicts the battle between the Olympian gods and the Giants. This photo shows a very small portion of the frieze, but I really like this portion! There are two lions pulling the chariot of Dionysis (only one is clearly visible, the other you can just make out its mane). They are attacking a giant; the artist did a great job using mouth opening on the helmet to relate what the giant was thinking, or should I say feeling... in the rest of the frieze are all the other gods - Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Hera, Ares... well, you get the idea!
Kouros Statues, the twins of Argos. the oldest offerings found at Delphi (early 6th century BC), they have been identified as Cleobis and Biton from Argos, heroes in their youth, the story goes that they yoked themselves to a wagon and pulled it with their mother 5 miles to attend the games of Hera. Afterward, they fell asleep and never woke up.
(they do look very muscular)
These photos in the museum show the discovery of the nearly intact Kouros Statues "one of the happiest moments of the French excavations 1893-1894)"
The Silver Bull from the 6th century BC
A life-sized statue of a bull, this would have had sheets of silver and gold attached to a wooden frame. Found buried in a pit near the Treasury of the Athenians, only fragments survived.
I've included this small piece in my museum highlights, because it is one of my favorite stories, when Odysseus hides under a ram to escape the Cyclops. (And they've included it in the museum, so it must be important.) This is so tiny, I've enlarged it for better viewing.
The Bronze Charioteer
The best piece in the museum's collection is at the end of the tour; the statue commemorates a victory in the Pythian Games in 474 BC.
The statue is 5'11''; it is quite remarkable that it is in such good condition. Seeing the reins still in his hand is amazing, even the eyes are still present, which is very unusual.
The chariot and horses that pulled the chariot did not survive as well; only a few pieces remain. Also, there would have been a stable boy in the ensemble, only one arm has been found. The museum has done a fantastic job portraying the scene.
The Sanctuary of Apollo
Zeus let loose two great eagles, to fly from opposite ends of the earth, to find the center. The eagles flew over the earth until they met; it was here that Zeus threw down a stone and proclaimed it the navel, or omphalos, of the world.
Excavations show that there was a sanctuary here at Delphi, devoted to Gaea (mother of the gods) as early as the 15th century BC.
It wasn't until the 6th century BC that Delphi really expanded in importance, with both the the oracle at the Temple of Apollo and the religious festivals held every 4 years (the Pythian games).
We followed the Sacred Way, the same path as all people who came before us. Most of the site lies in ruins, but the pathway would have been lined with magnificent buildings (called treasuries) and statues, gifts to Apollo as thanks for guidance they received and also, maybe more importantly, as a show of wealth and power.
The restored Treasury of the Athenians - built to celebrate the Athenians victory over the Persians at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, filled with the spoils of the war. The temple was rebuilt in 1904.
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The Omphalos, or Navel
The Athenian Stoa and Polygonal Wall - an open-air porch where the Athenians displayed the spoils from their victory over the Persians at the Battle of Salamis in 480 BC. The retaining wall supports the terrace above and the Temple of Apollo.
What makes this wall unique is not only the shape of its stones, but also the 1200 names of slaves inscribed on the stones. For slaves that had bought their freedom, the owners placed the slave's name here, near the Temple of Apollo, symbolically giving the slave to the gods and making their freedom public.
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The Temple of Apollo
The temple was the object of those who came to Delphi - to seek advice or answers from the Oracle.
Before entering the temple, they would first purify themselves at the Kastalian springs just to the east of the sanctuary, then offer a sacrifice in the courtyard.
Inside the temple, the priestess (oracle) would descend into a lower room, where she sat on a tripod over a fissure in the earth. Fumes with hallucinogenic properties would seep through the fissures (some say the fumes came from burning laurel leaves) and the priestess would go into a trance.
She would then be possessed by the god Apollo, who would give the advice or answer to a question in coherent but fragmented and confusing words.
A priest standing in the room above would write down the words and translate them into a poem, which was then given to the person who sought the advice. The recipient then had to interpret the ambiguous words from the oracle, not an easy task.
One well-known response from the Oracle:
Croesus was King of Lydia (in western Turkey); he began to formulate plans to invade Persia. So he went to Delphi to seek the Oracle's advice. The response from Apollo was: ‘If you make war on the Persians, you will destroy a great empire.’ Croesus made a fatal mistake of assuming that the reference to ‘a great empire’ meant Persia. However, it was his empire that was destroyed.
This rather odd-looking stone was removed from the floor of the small, sunken room located on the southwestern side of the Temple of Apollo.
Is this possibly the stone upon which the oracle sat on her tripod?
The Theatre at Delphi
Originally designed to host song contests honoring Apollo during the Pythian Games. The winners would have been awarded a wreath of laurel leaves.
Over time the games would have expanded to include athletic competitions, which would have taken place at the stadium, as well as dance and other arts.
The Bronze Charioteer would have been placed just outside the entrance to the theatre, greeting guests. The opening and closing ceremonies were held here, much like we have today with the Olympics.
After visiting the archaeological site, I decided to continue down the hill to the sanctuary of Athena Pronaia (Pronaia means the one before the temple of Apollo). This is the photo you always see on the postcards of Delphi. Very picturesque and very quiet! I was one of only a very few people here, and the only one from our tour group.
The thing about going downhill is that you forget you have to go back up! I had to hoof it back up the hill fairly quickly to make it in time for dinner.
As you can see in the pictures, the sun was getting fairly low in the sky, casting long shadows. It gave everything a different feeling. A quick glance as I scurried past the statue of Prometheus and the flags, I made it back to the hotel with 15 minutes to spare before dinner.
Our group meal was in town at the Taverna Bacchus.
Again, I don't remember a thing we had for dinner!
I did get a picture of the view, though, it was spectacular!!
The perfect ending to a wonderful day here at Delphi.
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