Rising one hundred and fifty metres above the centre of modern Athens, the Acropolis is one of the most internationally recognised single sites in the world and the principal symbolic heart of ancient Greek civilisation. The limestone outcrop has been occupied continuously since the Neolithic period and served progressively as a Mycenaean royal palace, an early Greek religious sanctuary, a classical Athenian sacred precinct and a medieval Frankish fortress before being recognised in the modern period as the principal cultural inheritance of ancient Greece. The original Mycenaean palace and cyclopean walls of the late Bronze Age occupied the summit of the rock between around 1400 and 1200 BC and provided the original mythological setting for the legends of King Theseus and the early Athenian kings. The palace was abandoned around 1100 BC during the wider collapse of the Mycenaean civilisation, and the summit was converted to religious use during the gradual revival of Greek urban culture in the eighth and seventh centuries BC. The principal classical buildings on the Acropolis date from a single concentrated rebuilding programme commissioned by the Athenian statesman Pericles between 447 and 432 BC. The programme replaced the various earlier temples that had been destroyed by the Persian invasion of 480 BC and was funded by the substantial tribute payments collected from the various member states of the Delian League. The new buildings were intended to express the cultural and political supremacy of Athens at the height of its imperial power. The principal four buildings of the Periclean programme include the Parthenon, the great Doric temple of Athena Parthenos completed by Phidias, Ictinus and Callicrates between 447 and 432 BC. The Propylaea, the monumental gateway designed by Mnesicles, was completed in 432 BC and provided the formal entrance to the sanctuary. The small temple of Athena Nike, completed in around 420 BC, balances the Propylaea on its southern bastion. The Erechtheion, completed in 406 BC, replaced the earlier temple of Athena Polias and houses the famous porch of the Caryatids. The Acropolis has been progressively restored and conserved over the past two centuries since the establishment of the modern Greek state in 1832. The various restoration campaigns have removed the medieval and Ottoman additions, consolidated the surviving classical architecture and replaced damaged elements with carefully matched new marble where necessary. The current ongoing restoration programme is one of the most ambitious archaeological conservation projects anywhere in the world.

Type: Tourist Attraction

Address: Acropolis, Athens, Greece