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We don't often get the opportunity to visit inland sites,
but our trip between Greece's mainland and the Peloponnesian peninsula enabled
us to visit the oracle at Delphi. According to Plutarch, who was a priest
there, a shepherd noticed that his flock acted strangely when they were near a
specific crevice in the rock. When he approached, he began to spout
prophecies.
The villagers eventually chose a priestess, usually a
woman over fifty, to sit on a three-legged stool above the chasm. She gave up
normal life for her assignment. She performed some purification and other
rituals and then sank into a trance to hear the questions of worshippers. She
answered in gibberish, interpreted by the priests.
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Legend holds that Zeus, the
leader of all the gods, sent two eagles from the ends of the universe to
find its center.
The Temple of Apollo, the seat
of the oracle, sits upon the spot that they impaled each other. Only a
few columns remain and the foundations of the rest of the temple. At the
left of the temple are the remains of the theater, which seated five thousand people.
Both structures were built in the fourth century BC. |
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The museum on site at Delphi contains
thousands of ancient objects. That anything was left for us to see at
Delphi is remarkable. In 86 BC, Delphi was plundered by the Roman
general Sulla, and two decades later Nero took about five hundred bronze
statues.
The god Apollo killed the serpent Python at Delphi,
and to celebrate his victory, the Pythian Games were established, There
were athletic and musical contests, and the games were made quadrennial
in 582 BC.
The bronze charioteer at left is the remaining
portion of a statue that included four bronze horses and two grooms. It
was created in commemoration of a victory of a Syracusan prince at the
Pythian Games in the fifth century BC. The eyes are inlaid with a
material like enamel, and they seem to follow your gaze. The folds of
the chiton, his uniform, look almost soft. |
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The Isthmus of Corinth once connected
the Peloponnesian peninsula to Greece's mainland. Ancient rulers,
including Nero, tried to build a canal. It was a burden to drag
ships across the four-mile isthmus during their journeys between the
Ionian and the Aegean. But in those days, empires were short-lived and
rulers often had more pressing economic priorities than creating civic
infrastructure.
The
French and the Greeks built the Corinth Canal at the end of the nineteenth century.
This canal turns a trip of a hundred
and fifty miles around the Peloponnesian coast into a four-mile boat ride. |
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