Page 54 - MYCONIAN COLLECTION MAG 2021

discover|sacred island
“When the Ancient Greeks built
Delos, it was from Mykonos that they
took the materials. And conversely,
when Delos collapsed, the Mykoni-
ans took these materials back again
to build and fortify their own houses!”
– Dr Dimitris Athanasoulis
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WORKING LIFE AT AN ANCIENT SANCTUARY
“Delos is a different, magical place; a place that’s unlike any other. Even today, Delos is unique”, antiquities curator
Dr Themistoklis Vakoulis says. He has been living on Delos year-round since 2015 in his capacity at the Ephorate. “The Ephorate
of Antiquities of Cyclades does for Delos what local authorities do everywhere else. We organise transport to and from Mykonos, staff
the ancient city in a comparable way to Pompeii. This is not possible accommodation on the island, infrastructure, equipment. Besides supporting the employees, the Ephorate also manages the archaeological
in any other ancient city in Greece. There are many Roman cities site, welcoming 155 thousand visitors annually, preserving and restoring the monuments. The monuments are our top priority, and
in the Middle East, Syria or Africa which are in good condition, everything else follows. But how much work can a small island – a rocky islet – really take? How many cranes, how many ships can
but on Delos you experience a scenery unchanged since antiquity, come? And how can this work be scheduled around keeping Delos open to the public? We can’t just bring
which we could say represents time itself! Even people who believe 30 million euro and start spending – the island would crash. We need to prioritise and categorise its needs. Life here is hard.
themselves to be indifferent to the past leave Delos having gained The employees spend so many hours together that we have to be pro-active about their wellbeing, promote good relationships,
something from their visit”. provide activities… Delos is testing – if you don’t take here, if you don’t integrate, the island will reject you”.
STAGES IN HISTORY
“It is worth stopping at the Sanctuary of Apollo first, as it is the
reason the city was called into existence as one of the largest Hellenic
sanctuaries in the Mediterranean. Imbued with the meaning of
‘sanctity’, this sacred place already existed in Homer’s era and
reached its peak during the Archaic period (7th-6th century BC) and
the Classical period (5th-4th century BC). Citizens from the outer
reaches of the Greek world travelled to the island to worship the
God of Light. From the mid-6th century BC up to the 4th century
BC, Athens imposed itself politically and culturally on the sacred
island. During that period, the Sanctuary was the centre of the
Athenian Republic, a symbol for the birth of western civilisation,
and headquarters of the Athenian Empire (also known as the Delian
League). When the League ceased to exist, this great Hellenistic model
city developed, encompassing all aspects of the Greek World. The
Hellenistic city, remains of which visitors can see today, developed
after 167 BC, when the Romans gave Delos back to the Athenians
and declared it a free port; a move which contributed to its rapid
economic ascent. Merchants, bankers and shipowners from all of
the known world settled there, attracting a large number of masons,
craftsmen and sculptors. It was a large city with public buildings
such as the Bouleuterion (Assembly House), the Prytaneion and
the Ekklesiasterion, with religious and merchant guilds such as the
Poseidonianists of Beirut housed in buildings, squares with votive
offerings from Italian guilds such as the Agora of the Competaliasts
and unique houses decorated with murals, mosaic floors and statues.
It was a transport hub for the Eastern Mediterranean due to the
privileges granted by the Romans and encouraged an unprecedented
cosmopolitanism, where all the peoples of the known world met,
accumulating enormous amounts of wealth which was invested in
constructing an elaborate city with winding streets, unique buildings
such as the only marble theatre in the Aegean as well as three-storey
houses (The House of the Lake, The House of Dolphins, The House
of Masks, The House of the Trident, The House of Dionysus and
The House of Cleopatra) with colonnades and unique mosaics.
And if the squares and narrow streets of this 2nd century BC city
have the same ambience as those of Mykonos Town, let us remind
ourselves that in antiquity, Mykonos was a satellite of Delos. When
the Ancient Greeks built Delos, it was from Mykonos that they took
the materials. And conversely, when Delos collapsed, the Mykonians
took these materials back again to build and fortify their own houses!
What is of particular interest for the contemporary visitor is the
phenomenon of universality. The fact that ‘foreigners’ from all over
the world lived in Delos, that there was open trade with the East
and the West and a vast syncretism – an amalgamation of different
religions, cultures, or schools of thought – with Greek temples but
also places of worship from other Eastern religions such as the
Temple of Isis and the Synagogue”.
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