Piraeus
- By Minoan Corfu
- 14/07/2014
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Piraeus, once Porto Leone or Porto Draco, is a historic industrial city and important port of Attica as well as of the south-eastern Mediterranean. The city’s centre is approximately 12 km from the centre of Athens, also constituting its harbour. Its historic course is unbreakably linked to the sea, to which it owes its economic and cultural development.
| MAJOR CITY ATTRACTIONS |
Archaeological Museum of Piraeus
The Archaeological Museum of Piraeus offers visitors the representative and complete picture of the history of the city, which during ancient times was blooming so much as a commercial centre of the eastern Mediterranean as well as a naval dockyard of ancient Athens. The type of exhibits, coming mainly from the wider area of Piraeus and of the Attica coast, and the time range covered, from the Mycenaean to the Roman period, are representative of the distinctiveness, the composition of the population and the history of Piraeus.
Hellenic Maritime Museum
The Hellenic Maritime Museum, of a total surface area of approximately 2,500 m², (including the atrium), is located in Piraeus in the deepest recess of the bay of Freatida, in Themistokleous coast as formed with the creation of the marina. This museum is the largest of its kind in Greece and revives the long history of the glorious Greek maritime tradition. The rich archive material and the photographic records of the Hellenic Maritime Museum are ranked among the most important for the history of the Mediterranean Sea.
Municipal Theatre of Piraeus
The Municipal Theatre is located in the city’s centre and was built following the exact same designs of the Bolshoi theatre by architect and professor at the National Technical University, Ioannis Lazarimos. The Municipal Theatre presented, occasionally, the most known Greek theatre companies, the National Theatre, the Greek National Opera, etc. For an extended period of time, various auxiliary spaces housed the Municipal Library of Piraeus as well as the Municipal Art Gallery.
MunicipalArt Gallery
The Municipal Art Gallery of Piraeus is an art museum in Piraeus’ city centre. The Municipal Art Gallery possesses a collection of 80 sculptures by George Kastriotis, a collection of 156 works by folk artist St. Lazarou, as well as the donation by the renowned actor Manos Katrakis (theatre costumes, photographs and theatrical material, personal items, etc).
Veakeio Theatre
The open air Veakeio Municipal Theatre is found in one of the most beautiful locations of Piraeus, on Kastella hill (Profitis Ilias) at an altitude of 86.59 m. and with a magnificent view to the sea. It was constructed and started to operate in June 1969. The current theatre’s name (“Veakeio”) was given in July 1976, after a decision of the Municipal Council to honour the great Greek actor Aimilios Veakis (1884 – 1951), who was born in Piraeus. The Veakeio Theatre during the summer months is the centre of significant art activities, with appearances of Greek and foreign theatre companies, folklore groups with international reputation, as well as concerts by well-known artists.
Athenstoday is a modern and famous city, since in ancient times it was a powerful city-state and a very important cultural centre. It is considered to be the most historic city in Europe. It is known all over the world for its historic monuments preserved throughout the centuries.
| MAJOR CITY ATTRACTIONS |
Acropolis
The area of the Acropolis offers the masterpieces of the centuries, the Parthenon, the Propylaea, the Temple of Athena Nike and the Erechtheum. Around Acropolis there is Areopagus, Pnyx, the Theatre of Dionysus, the Philopappos Monument and the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, housing today performances within the framework of Athens Festival. Monuments of equal importance for Athens are Kerameikos, where renowned Athenians are buried and Colonos, the holy temple of hospitality and inviolable asylum. The area of Academia is found further away from the historic hill. Plato founded there his Academy and developed his philosophical principles.
Parthenon
The Parthenon, a temple constructed exclusively with Pentelic marble to honour the Greek goddess Athena, protector of the city of Athens, was the result of a co-operation between important architects and sculptors in the mid-5th century BC. Its value lies in the fact that it is not the work of a genius, but a creation of a whole race, the supreme expression of a great civilization.
Erechtheum
According to mythology this is where Athena and Poseidon wrangled for the dominance over the city. According to the legend, Poseidon, the god of the Sea hit the rock with his trident and sea water sprung from that point. Then, Athena struck with her spear and an olive tree sprouted. The gods gave the victory to Athena. The Athenians, however, wishing to reconcile the two rival gods dedicated one temple to each one of them under the same roof.
Temple of Athena Nike
The Temple of Athena Nike is located on the south-western side of the Holy Rock. It was built from 426 until 421 BC and was designed by Callicrates. The construction of the classic temple of Athena Nike is integrated in the extended building project of Acropolis during the age of Pericles.
The Acropolis Museum
The Acropolis Museum is an archaeological museum focused on the finds from the archaeological site of Acropolis in Athens. It was constructed to house every object found on the holy rock of Acropolis and at its foot covering a wide time period from the Mycenaean period to Roman and Paleochristian Athens. The walk in its exhibition rooms is a journey through history, among the masterpieces of the Archaic and Classical period, as well as through the ancient neighbourhoods of Athens.
The Museum offers many possibilities for relaxation and recreation, with a vast variety of exhibits and incorporates a familiar environment for the most ingenious works of antiquity.
Byzantine and Christian Museum
The Byzantine and Christian Museum of Athens is one of the most important public museums in Greece. It was established during the early 20th century (1914) in order to collect, study, preserve and exhibit the Byzantine and Post-Byzantine cultural heritage in the Greek territory.
The museum’s collection contains an important number of works of art (approximately 30,000) such as portable icons, sculptures, ceramics, church textiles, paintings, miniatures and architectural elements (wall paintings and mosaics).
National Archaeological Museum
The National Archaeological Museum is the largest and most important museum in Greece and one of the most important museums in the world. Although its original purpose was to house all the finds from the 19th century excavations, mainly from Attica, as well as from other areas of the country, it was gradually enriched with finds from all over the Ancient Greek world. Its wide collections, with more than 20,000 exhibits, offer the visitor a panorama of the ancient Greek civilization from the early prehistory until the late antiquity.
Benaki Museum
The Museum was founded by Antonios Benakis, offspring of a historic family from Alexandria, Egypt. The Museum’s collections include 33,000 works of art, recording the historic journey of the Greek world, from ancient times to the Asia Minor catastrophe. An exceptional position is held by the collections of Toys and Childhood, Coptic and Chinese art, as well as the exhibition room with works by the great Greek painter, Nikos Chatzikyriakos-Gikas.
National Gallery
The National Gallery was created following a donation from Greek lawyer Alexandros Soutzos, who in 1896 left his estate to the State aiming to the creation of a Museum of Fine Arts. The National Gallery opened four years later, on July 28th 1900. It originally exhibited 258 works from the collections of the Technical University (where a small gallery had been created a few years ago) and of the University. The following year 107 works were included from the collection of A. Soutzos that he had also bequeathed to the Greek State.
National Glyptotheque
The sculptures acquired their own building with the National Glyptotheque which is located in the former military installations in Goudi.
