It was a cool February morning in Athens and I was lost.
My map said that the Panathenaic Stadium, an oasis of marble built in 144 AD, was nearby.
But around me, there was nothing but buzzing traffic and a few people walking around in the sun.
Surely the mythical Olympic stadium couldn’t be bang in the middle of a traffic intersection?
I was wrong.
The Pananthenaic Stadium in Athens hosted the first modern Olympics
in 1896. Originally built in 330 BC for the Panathenaic Games, it was
rebuilt in 144 AD by Herodes Atticus, an Athenian Roman senator.
Like a sphinx which rose from its ashes, the stadium had been destroyed many times before it shone on the world’s stage one more time: as a venue for the opening ceremony in Athens Olympics in 2004.
The sphinx stood in front of me, with its ancient memory of many sportsmen winning and losing, right in the middle of a busy traffic intersection. The only stadium in the world to be built entirely of marble, it was abandoned with the rise of Christianity. In 1869, it was excavated and hosted the Zappas Olympics in 1870 and 1875
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