FROM DELPHI TO ATHENS TO......BLAGOEVGRAD
Where did we leave off.......oh, yes, the oracle at Delphi. The original oracle of the santuary was dedicated to Ge, the Earth Goddess. Later when Apollo came here he had to face may challenges, including a battle with the python who guarded the sanctuary of Ge. He was successful and established his own sanctuary with an oracle referred to as Pythia (after the snake).
Through the Pythis he was said to hear the will of Zeus. As the years passed by, many pilgrims came to this place to hear the prophecy of the oracle. The process went something like this: outside the sanctuary (on the left side of the picture beyond the columns) the piligrim would bathe and then make a sacrifice (maybe a goat or somthing). After this, "he" would enter the sanctuary which held three rooms. One room held the pilgrim; one held the priest; and in the center was the oracle. The pilgrim would then pose a question: "will I live a long life?" The priest would pass this on to the oracle. She would then smell the vapors that arose from the ground and go into a trance and mumble some things. The priest, who was the only one who could interpret the oracle, would then give the answer: "long not short." So, we have no clue what the oracle might have said (such as: leave me alone--I'm into my vapors) but the priest would always give a double answer so he would never be wrong. Was it "you'll live a long life, not a short one" or "a long life you will not live, instead it will be short."
There is one really interesting story about a specific pilgrim to visit the oracle, and that is Alexander of Macedonia. As you know from our previous postings, Alexander has been a recurring feature of our trips (like those darned dexters). According to a recent biography (Brent just read), Alexander stopped to make a dedication to the oracle before one of his long quests to conquer land. He was refused a visit because it was an unfavorable day. This did not deter him and he hauled the oracle to her shrine requiring her to say if he was "invincible." She admitted that he was. While the reality of this story is questionned, the story was told far and wide, and therefore was "rich in its conseqences." Alexander's troops believed the oracle's prediction and they were encouraged to spread the word. It is believed that this tale was an important reason his troops grew so large and why he faced relatively limited resistance. 
Later, in Athens, Alexander proposed he be seen as an invincible god. Only one hero had ever been claimed to be invincible, and that was Heracles, son of Zeus. We have heard that Alexander subsequently made claims to be descended from Heracles (he also claimed to be related to Achilles). What a guy! Here he is with his lion helmet.
There were a lot of activities to take place at Delphi, inlcuding the Pythia games. These were the second most important panhellenic games after the Olympic. Because Greece was divided into many small city-states, these games served the purpose of bringing people together and maintaining bonds.
In the beginning the games were every 8 years and focused on musical performances. After 582 BC the games moved to every 4 years and new events were added. One was track and field. There were many running events where men would start at one end (the starting blocks are pictured here) and run end to end several times. We even took a jog down and back to get in the mood.
Another field event was a type of long jump. However, what made this event a bit unique is that the men started by holding a set of weights (pictured here) and at some point in the jump let the weights go and propelled themselves even further. Not sure I get it, but I'm sure it was fun to watch.
One very popular event was the chariot race. As with the winners of the other events, the winning driver received a laurel wreath (from the tree sacred to Apollo), and he had the right to erect a statue of himself within the area of Delphi. The "treasure" of the Delphi museum is this bronze statue of one chariot driver, which dates to 470 BC. He is Polyzalos-- the tyrant of Gela in Sicily. We heard that one year Nero of Rome came to the Pythia and won ALL of the events. (Would you try to beat him?) He received many laurel wreaths and now we now how this fashion in Rome began.
What would a trip to Athens be without going to the archeological musuem--one of the best in the world. We spent all afternoon there on Monday and found ourselves rushing at the end just to say we saw a bit of each room. The bust of Alexander above was there, along with lots of other statues. One interesting set of statues were those discovered in the shipwreck of the Antikythera. Found in 1900 by fishermen, these bronze statues were probably headed for Rome around the first century and were copies of originals dating back to the 5th century BC.
While you cannot tell this from the selection of photographs we've included, many (it seemed like most) of the men are carved nude. What a refreshing change (in my opinion, I won't say it was Brent's) from looking at naked women in paintings all the time.
The famous gold death mask of Agememnon was here, but of course it could not have been Agamemnon because it dates long before his birth. But it was part of the find that helped "rediscover" a part of history that for years was thought to be myth.
Upstairs were a couple of frescoes and pottery found on the island of Santorini. The artwork (as old as much of the other items we saw at the museum) was very different in terms of its colors and schemes. Dominating much of the work was sea life, including lots of paintings of dolphins.
On our last morning we went up the remaining hill for some final views. The picture of us from the last blog was taken from Filiopappas Hill next to the monument built for the Roman consul (Filiopappas) in 115 AD. Next to this monument was the Hill of the Pnyx, which was a meeting place of the Democratic Assembly in the 5th century BC (Here's Brent giving a lecture). After this time, the meetings moved across to the theater of Dionysos below the acropolis.
As Athens was our last adventure out of Bulgaria, this will most likely be our last blog for the trip. We have lots of grading, and of course we need to pack. However, I don't want you to think that all we did was travel. It felt like that sometimes, but really, we did have a job this semester at the American University in Bulgaria. If you return to one of the first entries you can see my discussion of the very interesting set of students that I taught in Introduction to Sociology. They comes from 8 countries and speak 15 languages among them. While I still cannot pronounce all of their names very well, I feel as though I learned a lot about southeastern Europe and the former-Communist countries through interactions with these students. So, I leave you with a picture of us taken on the last day of class. Some of the students were having fun, making part of the OSU gestures from my school [Pam, take note, they don't get the S right here either.]
Dovijdane. See you soon!!
Where did we leave off.......oh, yes, the oracle at Delphi. The original oracle of the santuary was dedicated to Ge, the Earth Goddess. Later when Apollo came here he had to face may challenges, including a battle with the python who guarded the sanctuary of Ge. He was successful and established his own sanctuary with an oracle referred to as Pythia (after the snake).
Through the Pythis he was said to hear the will of Zeus. As the years passed by, many pilgrims came to this place to hear the prophecy of the oracle. The process went something like this: outside the sanctuary (on the left side of the picture beyond the columns) the piligrim would bathe and then make a sacrifice (maybe a goat or somthing). After this, "he" would enter the sanctuary which held three rooms. One room held the pilgrim; one held the priest; and in the center was the oracle. The pilgrim would then pose a question: "will I live a long life?" The priest would pass this on to the oracle. She would then smell the vapors that arose from the ground and go into a trance and mumble some things. The priest, who was the only one who could interpret the oracle, would then give the answer: "long not short." So, we have no clue what the oracle might have said (such as: leave me alone--I'm into my vapors) but the priest would always give a double answer so he would never be wrong. Was it "you'll live a long life, not a short one" or "a long life you will not live, instead it will be short." 
There is one really interesting story about a specific pilgrim to visit the oracle, and that is Alexander of Macedonia. As you know from our previous postings, Alexander has been a recurring feature of our trips (like those darned dexters). According to a recent biography (Brent just read), Alexander stopped to make a dedication to the oracle before one of his long quests to conquer land. He was refused a visit because it was an unfavorable day. This did not deter him and he hauled the oracle to her shrine requiring her to say if he was "invincible." She admitted that he was. While the reality of this story is questionned, the story was told far and wide, and therefore was "rich in its conseqences." Alexander's troops believed the oracle's prediction and they were encouraged to spread the word. It is believed that this tale was an important reason his troops grew so large and why he faced relatively limited resistance. 
Later, in Athens, Alexander proposed he be seen as an invincible god. Only one hero had ever been claimed to be invincible, and that was Heracles, son of Zeus. We have heard that Alexander subsequently made claims to be descended from Heracles (he also claimed to be related to Achilles). What a guy! Here he is with his lion helmet.There were a lot of activities to take place at Delphi, inlcuding the Pythia games. These were the second most important panhellenic games after the Olympic. Because Greece was divided into many small city-states, these games served the purpose of bringing people together and maintaining bonds.
In the beginning the games were every 8 years and focused on musical performances. After 582 BC the games moved to every 4 years and new events were added. One was track and field. There were many running events where men would start at one end (the starting blocks are pictured here) and run end to end several times. We even took a jog down and back to get in the mood.
Another field event was a type of long jump. However, what made this event a bit unique is that the men started by holding a set of weights (pictured here) and at some point in the jump let the weights go and propelled themselves even further. Not sure I get it, but I'm sure it was fun to watch.
One very popular event was the chariot race. As with the winners of the other events, the winning driver received a laurel wreath (from the tree sacred to Apollo), and he had the right to erect a statue of himself within the area of Delphi. The "treasure" of the Delphi museum is this bronze statue of one chariot driver, which dates to 470 BC. He is Polyzalos-- the tyrant of Gela in Sicily. We heard that one year Nero of Rome came to the Pythia and won ALL of the events. (Would you try to beat him?) He received many laurel wreaths and now we now how this fashion in Rome began.
What would a trip to Athens be without going to the archeological musuem--one of the best in the world. We spent all afternoon there on Monday and found ourselves rushing at the end just to say we saw a bit of each room. The bust of Alexander above was there, along with lots of other statues. One interesting set of statues were those discovered in the shipwreck of the Antikythera. Found in 1900 by fishermen, these bronze statues were probably headed for Rome around the first century and were copies of originals dating back to the 5th century BC.
While you cannot tell this from the selection of photographs we've included, many (it seemed like most) of the men are carved nude. What a refreshing change (in my opinion, I won't say it was Brent's) from looking at naked women in paintings all the time.
The famous gold death mask of Agememnon was here, but of course it could not have been Agamemnon because it dates long before his birth. But it was part of the find that helped "rediscover" a part of history that for years was thought to be myth.
Upstairs were a couple of frescoes and pottery found on the island of Santorini. The artwork (as old as much of the other items we saw at the museum) was very different in terms of its colors and schemes. Dominating much of the work was sea life, including lots of paintings of dolphins.
On our last morning we went up the remaining hill for some final views. The picture of us from the last blog was taken from Filiopappas Hill next to the monument built for the Roman consul (Filiopappas) in 115 AD. Next to this monument was the Hill of the Pnyx, which was a meeting place of the Democratic Assembly in the 5th century BC (Here's Brent giving a lecture). After this time, the meetings moved across to the theater of Dionysos below the acropolis.
As Athens was our last adventure out of Bulgaria, this will most likely be our last blog for the trip. We have lots of grading, and of course we need to pack. However, I don't want you to think that all we did was travel. It felt like that sometimes, but really, we did have a job this semester at the American University in Bulgaria. If you return to one of the first entries you can see my discussion of the very interesting set of students that I taught in Introduction to Sociology. They comes from 8 countries and speak 15 languages among them. While I still cannot pronounce all of their names very well, I feel as though I learned a lot about southeastern Europe and the former-Communist countries through interactions with these students. So, I leave you with a picture of us taken on the last day of class. Some of the students were having fun, making part of the OSU gestures from my school [Pam, take note, they don't get the S right here either.]
Dovijdane. See you soon!!
posted by WarnerSteel at 4:22 AM
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