The Acropolis of Athens

The word acropolis comes from Greek: ἄκρος means “highest” and πόλις means “city”. So an ἀκρόπολις is the “high city”, the top part of a town, where people could defend themselves. Many Greek cities had one, but the most famous is the Acropolis of Athens.

It is a big rock in the middle of Athens. Its sides are steep, and only the west side is easy to climb. Strong walls have protected the top for more than 3,300 years. The first wall was built in the 13th century BC, around the home of a Mycenaean ruler.

In the 8th century BC the rock became a holy place. The Athenians worshipped Athena there, the goddess who protected their city. Her name and the name of the city are almost the same: Ἀθηνᾶ and Ἀθῆναι. Every year the Athenians held a great festival for her, the Panathenaia (Παναθήναια).

In 490 BC the Athenians beat the Persian army at Marathon. Soon after, they began a huge new temple on the Acropolis. But it was never finished. In 480 BC the Persians came back, took Athens and destroyed the temples on the rock.

For some years the holy place stayed in ruins. Then, in 448 BC, the Athenians decided to rebuild it. At that time Athens was rich and powerful. Its leader, Pericles (Περικλῆς), started a great building programme that lasted for the rest of the century.

The Greek writer Plutarch tells us that Pericles chose the sculptor Pheidias (Φειδίας) to watch over all the work. The architects of the Parthenon were Iktinos and Kallikrates. Builders and sculptors worked for many years with shining white marble (μάρμαρον). They made the buildings so beautiful that people still come from all over the world to see them.

Visitors still climb up from the west side, and they still see four buildings from the time of Pericles:

• The Propylaia (Προπύλαια, “the gateway”): the grand entrance, built in 437–432 BC by the architect Mnesikles. It was never completely finished, because war broke out between Athens and Sparta.
• The Parthenon (Παρθενών): the great temple of Athena Parthenos, “Athena the maiden”, built in 447–438 BC. It has 8 columns at each end and 17 along each side. Inside stood a statue of Athena made of gold and ivory by Pheidias. A long carved band, the frieze, showed the Panathenaia festival.
• The temple of Athena Nike (Νίκη means victory): a small, elegant temple near the entrance, built in 427–424 BC.
• The Erechtheion (Ἐρέχθειον): a temple for Athena and the sea god Poseidon, built in 421–406 BC. Its famous porch has six statues of young women holding up the roof: the Caryatids (Καρυάτιδες).

The buildings had many owners after antiquity. The Parthenon became a Christian church, and later, under Ottoman rule, a mosque. In 1687 a Venetian army attacked the Acropolis. The Ottoman soldiers kept gunpowder inside the Parthenon. During the bombardment the gunpowder exploded, and large parts of the temple fell down.

In the early 1800s men working for the British Lord Elgin took many sculptures away, and also one of the Caryatids. Since 1833 the Acropolis has been an archaeological site of the modern Greek state. Since 1975 a committee of experts has guided careful repairs, stone by stone. In 1987 UNESCO added the Acropolis to its World Heritage List.

The rock is part of modern history too. In 1941, during the Second World War, German soldiers raised their flag on the Acropolis. One night, two young Greeks climbed up and took it down. You can read their story below.