Attica, East and West: Academic Program Notes for Winter 2011
Regular Members Michael Leese and Stephanie Craven inspect the Spartan wall at Dekeleia
December 9, 2011 We’ve been frequenting the National Museum, with Jack Davis for Bronze Age items, and with Nancy Bookidis, who lectured to us on the beginning of Archaic Sculpture.  She also took us through the Archaic section of the Akropolis Museum, and helped us sort through multiple pediments and dedications. On our day trip to Marathon, we considered the battle and the new casualty list, looked at the cemetery at Tsepi with Eleanna Prevedorou, who is studying the skeletal remains, and visited the tholos with horse burials in the dromos. We continued on to Ikaria and the quarries at Mt. Pentele. This week our day trip to Eleusis, Acharnai and Dekeleia took us out to the western side of Attica, and we saw a mix of lavish Roman donations to Eleusis, the Menidi tholos and the small but beautiful museum at Acharnai. We ended with a hike at Tatoï, the former summer residence of the former Greek royal family, and looked at the remains of the Spartan wall around a hill now used as the royal necropolis.  Thucydides’ account of the Spartan occupation in Book 7 became more vivid when we were able to catch the views through the forest down into the plain of central Athens. Nancy Bookidis with Regular Members in the National Museum The group looks at the maze of walls within the Telesterion Regular Member Jonathan MacLellan discusses the Mysteries in the Telesterion at Eleusis Read the previous Program Note