We didn’t have Alex’s class on Thursday so the week was pretty relaxed, and, as a result, my blog post will be less fact-oriented than usual. Undoubtedly, the highlight of my week was visiting the island of Delos. When I found out that there was a whole ancient Greek town that was partially intact, I knew that I needed to go. So far, my favorite traveling experience has been visiting Pompeii in Italy and I hoped that Delos would be similarly awesome (spoiler alert: it was). I convinced my roommates to join me and we made a weekend out of it by staying on Mykonos–one of the most popular tourist islands.
It was exciting to get to apply some of the knowledge I have gained on sight visits with Alex and to recognize similarities in architecture, art, and landscape. I wish we had a structured visit to Delos because I think I would have gotten a lot more out of it academically, but I appreciated being able to wander around and not worry about the facts too much.
During our first day in Mykonos, we visited the archaeological museum. While small, the museum had pretty good signage and had a great collection of artifacts from Mykonos and Delos. The archaeological museum on Delos was closed for renovations during our visit, so this provided some good background information and let us get closer to a few artifacts. Above, you can see a very detailed painting on a plaster wall that I think was found on Mykonos. I liked seeing the brush strokes of the painter and was surprised at how well a delicate painting like this had survived. I wonder where it would have originally been–in a home? in a dining room? inside or outside?
Below, there is a cool pithos pot with engravings that tell the story of the Trojan horse and an extremely detailed mosaic. The stones in the mosaic were all less than a centimeter in width and height! It was really nice to be able to get up close and personal with a mosaic, but I was surprised there wasn’t more protection around it. There were no details or engravings on the back side of the pithos, which was odd to me. Usually pots are decorated all around, so I wonder if this was only meant to be seen from one side.
After the archaeological museum, we visited a beach and soaked in the sun. Sadly, it was a little too chilly and windy to swim.
On Saturday, we made our way to the main event: Delos. It was a bit stormy, but, after suffering through a rocky boat ride, the sun came out to greet us. Delos is the mythical birthplace of Apollo and Artemis and was sacred to the Ancient Greeks. We had three hours to explore and I tried to make the most of it. I’m going to recount some of my favorite parts now. First, the Roman Agora. It was fun to see the Roman Agora on Delos after seeing the Athenian Agora. It was open and overgrown in the middle but was surrounded by shops enclosed by stone walls. There were two other agoras on the island–the Delian and the Competaliasts, but the Roman one was the largest and best showcased how life on the island would have been. It was quite vast and was beautiful with all of the wildflowers. One thing I appreciated about Delos was the lack of restrictions on where visitors could go. I was able to wander through the different shops and the agora.
Of course, I had to include a picture with the Naxian Lions. They were one of the most protected ruins on the island, probably because tourists would be climbing all over them otherwise. The lions are actually replicas and the originals are in the museum. I think it’s interesting that they chose to move the lions but create replicas. How did they choose to move these statues but not others? How did they decide to make exact replicas of the ruins instead of re-create full versions? And what are the ethics of conservations like this where it is unclear upon first glance that there aren’t the originals?
Of course we immediately noticed the statue bases lying around the island and identified them as either bronze or stone. The ones in the image would have held bronze statues due to the footprints embedded in them. It’s fun to apply knowledge we learned in class!
The mosaic below was in the House of the Masks–an extraordinary structure that held multiple rooms with huge mosaics on the floors. We weren’t able to get as close to these mosaics, but here is a similar mosaic to the one we saw in the museum with the lion. We saw another mosaic like this in another building on the site. I want to do more research into this motif. It made me question whether one was a replica or copy, but all of them looked pretty legit.
Throughout our visit, I payed a lot of attention to the drainage systems of the city. I had read before that they had an advanced sewage system, but it really blew me away. Evidence of aqueducts and sewage systems were everywhere. Often, there would be a section with a different type of stone that was clearly a drainage route. Other times, there were gutters or ditches for water transportation.
They had a public cistern for poor people to get water but some residences also had private water systems or wells. I was shocked when I saw how substantial and deep the public cistern was. They had some fantastic infrastructure.
We randomly ran into many pits such as the one below, which I speculate is a private cistern for a rich family. Maybe it is part of the larger public cistern but there wasn’t really any signage. They came in many sizes and often had large trees growing out of them.
We were able to squeeze in a hike to the top of Mt. Kynthos where the Sanctuary of Zeus and Athena was. There weren’t many ruins at the top, but we got an awesome 360 degree view of the Mediterranean and the whole site of Delos. The intense climb was well worth it.
I had a blast exploring Delos and I’m super excited for our Peloponnese trip next weekend! Greece is everything that I hoped it would be and more.