| The history of the Acropolis. | | | | that shook Athens in the 7th-6th Century BC did was |
| The tourist guide said: | | | | to take the Acropolis and fortify their positions there. |
| Greece is popular for its long history. There are | | | | The Persians destroyed the buildings on the hill in 479 |
| hundreds of archaeological and historical places to visit | | | | BC and General Sulla's Roman army, which invaded |
| in Greece | | | | Athens in 86 BC, also did a lot of harm. The soldiers |
| Greece is a country in southeastern Europe. Greece is | | | | looted all statues they could lay their hands on. The |
| situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula. | | | | buildings survived the pillage. But the Parthenon |
| The country has land borders with Albania, the | | | | suffered additional damage when it was successfully |
| Republic of Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and | | | | turned into a church, a mosque and a gunpowder |
| Turkey to the east. | | | | magazine. |
| The white walls of the Acropolis hide wars, sieges and | | | | The darkest part of the Acropolis' past happened |
| corruption scandals. | | | | during the most glorious period of its experience: the |
| During one of the battles in the War of Independence, | | | | Golden Age. Following the rule that no good deed |
| the Greek insurgents encountered a serious problem. | | | | goes unpunished, the turn of events affected the very |
| They had taken Athens and surrounded the Ottomans | | | | man who had made the Acropolis a wonder of the |
| in the Acropolis, but just when their enemies were | | | | world. |
| finishing their ammunitions, things took a bad turn. The | | | | Phidias was a universally recognized genius. His |
| besieged threatened to destroy the Parthenon to | | | | statues of gods made such an impression that, |
| make bullets from the lead clamps holding its stones if | | | | according to his contemporaries, he was the only |
| they were not allowed to go free. | | | | mortal who had seen the Olympians in person. |
| The insurgents chose to keep the temple. It had | | | | Nevertheless, he got involved in a couple of scandals |
| already suffered significant damage. During the | | | | because of his work on the Acropolis. The problems |
| Venetian siege of 1688 a mortal bomb blew up the | | | | began when rumours spread that Phidias had stolen |
| gunpowder stored inside it and at the beginning of the | | | | some of the ivory and gold that he used to make the |
| 19th Century British ambassador Lord Elgin took away | | | | 12 m, or 40 ft, tall statue of Athena for the Parthenon. |
| most of its marble reliefs. | | | | The first known corruption scandal in history had a |
| The Acropolis enjoys the indisputable fame of one of | | | | spectacular ending. Phidias stripped down all gold from |
| the most harmonious architectural complexes in the | | | | the statue in public and had it weighed. Not a gram |
| world. Its proportions are both in accord with man and | | | | was missing. |
| provoke respect for the goddess it was devoted to. | | | | Then somebody examined the relief depicting the |
| It was something more than that, however. The | | | | battle between the Greeks and the Amazons on |
| buildings of the Acropolis, which were constructed | | | | Athena's shield. Two of the figures bore a striking |
| during the Golden Age of Athens under Pericles | | | | resemblance to Pericles and Phidias. The sculptor was |
| (448-429 BC), were a sort of large-scale publicity. | | | | convicted of blasphemy. |
| They extolled the virtues of the Athenian democracy, | | | | The absurdities on the Acropolis continued in modern |
| which had defeated the Persians and become s | | | | times too. In 1832 Greek King Otto1 turned the |
| superpower. Architects Ictinus, Callicrates and | | | | Parthenon into barracks for his personal guards but, |
| Mnesicles and sculptor Phidias turned the political | | | | fortuitously, did not manage to realize another of his |
| commission into a triumph of art. There is, however, an | | | | ideas - to build a palace on the hill. A new threat |
| embarrassing detail hiding behind the perfection of the | | | | appeared in the 1890. The reconstructions of the |
| buildings, friezes and caryatids. The Acropolis has a | | | | Parthenon took such an artistic turn that there was a |
| dark past. | | | | real danger the temple would end up looking totally |
| A solid wall guarded the temples and the palaces of | | | | different from what it did. The occupation during the |
| the local kings located on it. For this reason, the first | | | | Second World War resulted in yet another absurdity: |
| thing that the participants in each of the three coups | | | | the Acropolis acquired a post of Italian soldiers. |