Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
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fountains and elaborate wooden window screens, as well as silk wall hangings (not from
the mansion), shot with silver and gold thread. There's a top-floor café overlooking the
Kerameikos site with industrial Gázi beyond, as well as views of the Acropolis and
Filopáppou, while in the basement can be seen a substantial chunk of the ancient city
wall, almost 6m high, preserved during the building's restoration.
Kerameikos
Entrance on Ermoú • Summer Tues-Sun 8am-6.30pm; winter Tues-Sun 8.30am-3pm • €2 or joint Acropolis ticket • Metro Thissío
he Kerameikos (or Keramikós) site, encompassing one of the principal burial grounds
of ancient Athens and a hefty section of the ancient wall, provides a fascinating and
quiet retreat. Little visited, it has something of an oasis feel, with the lush Iridhanós
channel, speckled with water lilies, flowing across the site from east to west.
To the right of the entrance is the stream and the double line of the city wall . Two
roads pierced the wall here, and the gates that marked their entrance to the city have
been excavated: the great Dipylon Gate was the busiest in the ancient city, where the
road from Pireás, Eleusis and the north arrived; the Sacred Gate was a ceremonial
entrance where the Ierá Odhós or Sacred Way entered the city - it was used for the
Eleusinian and Panathenaic processions.
The Street of the Tombs
Branching of to the left from the Sacred Way is the Street of the Tombs , the old road
to Pireás. In ancient Greece people were frequently buried alongside roads, and
especially near gates, a practice at least partly related to the idea of death as a journey.
This site, by the principal routes into the Classical city, was clearly a prestigious one
and numerous commemorative monuments to wealthy or distinguished Athenians
have been excavated, their original stones reinstated or replaced by replicas. The flat,
vertical stelae were the main funerary monuments of the Classical world; the
sarcophagi that you see are later, from Hellenistic or Roman times. The large tomb
with the massive semicircular base to the left of the path is the Memorial of Dexileos ,
the 20-year-old son of Lysanias of Thorikos, who was killed in action at Corinth in 394
BC. The adjacent plot contains the Monument of Dionysios of Kollytos , in the shape of a
pillar stele supporting a bull carved from Pentelic marble.
The museum
he site museum is a lovely, cool, marble-floored space displaying finds from the site
and related material, above all stelae and grave markers. There are also many poignant
funerary offerings - toys from child burials, gold jewellery and beautiful small objects
of all sorts. The ceramics are particularly fine, including lovely dishes with horses on
their lids ( pyxides ) from the early eighth century BC and some stunning fifth-century
BC black-and-red figure pottery.
Gázi
Gázi , to the west and north of Kerameikos, is a former industrial area where the
reinvention of the old gasworks as the Tekhnópolis cultural centre (Pireós 100,
W
technopolis-athens.com; Metro Keramikós) has helped spark a rush of hip bars and
restaurants, as well as other exhibition sites such as the Benáki Museum Pireos St
Annexe (Pireós 138, W benaki.gr; Wed, Thurs & Sun 10am-6pm, Fri & Sat
10am-10pm, closed Aug; €3-6; Metro Petrálona, or many buses along Pireós
including #049, #B18 and trolley #21). By day the streets tend to be deserted, and
after dark, with so many derelict buildings, the surrounding area can feel threatening.
In practice it seems safe enough, but late at night you may want to take a taxi down
here; Gázi really comes into its own late on Friday night and over the weekend.
 
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