Greece 2023: The Agora Of Athens

Where the Greeks lived and traveled, they took with them the Agora.

We often translate agora as "marketplace" and it was in fact that, but it was much more.  It was the center of the Greek polis city life.  Business was conducted there, certainly - but other activities occurred there too: social, political, religious.  Men (it would have largely been men and free men at that) conducted there business and discussions beneath collonaded porches (called stoa).  Philosophers taught in the Agora:  Socrates is often found there in his discussions and Zeon of Citium started his teachings beneath the Stoa Poikile (Painted Stoa) of Athens.

The Agora of Athens has been excavated; walking it one can walk the the same streets and lanes as Perikles, Alkibiades, Sokrates, Plato, and a host of historical Greek figures.

The road on the left hand side is called The Panhellenic Way, and was the path by which the annual Panhellenic Festival made its way to the Acropolis.

This sign shows the reconstruction of the Athenian Agora.  There were many of these throughout our travels, which were very helpful in trying to visualize what we saw against what had previously existed.

The Bema, or Speaker's Platform.  We know of the location of such things from various sources, including the Greek Travelers Pausanias' 2nd Century A.D. journey through Greece.  Often on sites, this is the sort of thing one would see:  A simple note of what was there, leaving the viewer to their imagination.

The Athenian Mint:

A row of what would have been stalls, workshops, and businesses.

Looking back towards the Stoa of Attalos (2nd Century B.C., and worthy of a post all its own):

Looking up towards the Temple of Hephastion:

If I recall correctly, this was the location of an altar:

The Temple of Hephaestus.  Hephaestus (anglicized as Hephaestion) was the Greek god of crafts and forging.  The original temple was destroyed by the Persians in 479 B.C. and was rebuilt in its current form from 440 - 415 B.C.  The ruins are original (e.g., they have not been reconstructed).  Around the 7th century A.D. it was converted into a church.

Looking back towards the Agora and Acropolis.  One thing that strikes the viewer is how small the Agora really was.

Statues/Columns:

It was humbling to realize that in some small way, I trod the same historical paths as the great men I have read of.  The architecture and surrounding lands were obviously different and I had to use my imagination, but even now, faint traces of them remain, merely by the fact that people come from all over the world to see where they lived.