Athens, National Archaeological Museum

Q637187

That was not very clever: visiting the National Archaeological Museum on the last day of a two week trip through northern and central Greece. Of course, it was a nice summary of everything we’ve seen, but I think it would have been better to start over here. Ever a teacher, I might have used the museum’s splendid collection of sculpture to explain to my companions the development of Greek art.

That’s what you’ll find on the first floor: lots of sculpture in a series of rooms surrounding a large hall, which is devoted to Mycenaean art. There, you will find the golden objects from Mycenae that Schliemann found. The sculpture rooms surround it. Your tour starts with some kouroi and you can easily follow the growth to greater accuracy in representing the human body. When you’ve finished about a third of your tour, the Greek sculptors have mastered every aspect of anatomy, and you will pass along many classical sculptures, including two dazzling copies of the Diadumenus and the Cnidian Aphrodite. After that, more sculpture: the fourth century, Hellenism, and finally the Roman age.

On the ground floor, there’s also a series of rooms that contain metal art. Here, you will see the Anticythera Mechanism, but also collections of arrowheads from Marathon and Thermopylae. The Egyptian part – also on the ground floor – is a bit odd in a museum dedicated to Greek art, but the collection is too small to be exposed in a museum of its own and too important to keep stored away. In the Hellenistic part of the Egyptian collection, I noticed a statue of Hephaestion that I had never seen before.

Upstairs, you will find a marvelous collection of pottery and some objects that don’t fit anywhere else, like the Lemnian inscription, written in a language related to Etruscan. Next to it is a section dedicated to the investigations at Santorini, where some splendid frescoes have been found.

Do not forget to visit the basement. There’s a little café with a garden, where you will see some of the sculptures found in the Anticythera wreck. They have a certain beauty because they are partly eroded. I found the giant Heracles absolutely fascinating.

This museum was visited in 1989, 1992, 2004, 2007, 2010.

76 pictures related to this museum

Athens, Kerameikos, Siren	Argos, Relief of the Doryphorus of Polykleitos	Nysa, Bouleuterion, "Little Refugee"	Athens, Kerameikos, Base of the statue of a wrestler
Eretria, Gymnasium, Statue of Cleonicus	Corinth, Plate with Demeter	Sparta, Statue of Julia Aquilia Severa, damaged after her death	Oropos, Aeolian-Ionic capital
Megara, Statue of a Roman emperor (Trajan or Hadrian)	Gomphoi, Relief of Odysseus and Amphicleia	Argos, Theater, Statue of Aphrodite	Marathon, Arrowheads
Athens, Kerameikos, Dipylon krater	Megara, Statue of Dionysus	Thebes (?), Block statue of Prince Horwedja, governor and high priest in Heliopolis	The fight for the body of Patroclus.
Artemisium, Statue of Zeus	Larisa, Tombstone of Polyxena	Mycene, Boar's tusk helmet	Mycene, Dagger with lion hunt
Akrotiri, Building B, Room B1, Wall painting of antelopes	Aegina, Ptolemy VI Philometor	Eucratides II of Bactria	Lemnos, Tombstone of an Etruscan (?) warrior
Eretria, Lekythos (Bosanquet Painter)	Piraeus, Funerary stela of Damasistrate	Dodona, Figurine of Zeus Keraunos	Corinth, Relief of a hoplite
Mycene, Wall painting of a griffin with a warrior	Smyrna, Portrait of Caligula, reworked to resemble Titus	Athens, Stoa of Attalus, Attalus II Philadelphus	Piraeus, Funerary stela with ball players
Athens, Pnyx, Lenormant Athena	Lycian portrait of Omphale	Akrotiri, Building B, Room B1, Wall painting of boxers	Thebes, Head of Artemis
Olympia, Head of the boxer Satyros	Melos, Statue of Poseidon	Megiste, Bellerophon sarcophagus.	Piraeus, Head of a bearded god
Argos, Heraion, Sima	Piraeus, Statue of a woman or Demeter	Mycene, Wall painting ("La Parisienne")	Aegina, Tombstone of a young man, holding a bird
Zeus and Ganymedes	Mycene, House of the Warrior Krater, Warrior Krater	Chalcis-Vromousa, Head of a woman (Roman copy of a Greek original)	Alexandria, Hephaestion (part of a group with Alexander)
Argos, Heraion, Amazonomachy	Aegina, Temple of Apollo, Statue of a wounded warrior	Eleusis, Relief of a drunk Heracles	Athens, Kerameikos, Skull of Myrthis
Thermopylae, Arrowheads	Athens, Varvakeion Athena	Lebadeia, Relief of Trophonius	Athens, Statue of a Minotaur
Alexandria, Alexander the Great (part of a group with Hephaestion)	Pharsalus, Krater with a four-horse chariot	Lead figurine of Athena	Argos, Heraion, West pediment, Palladion
Decree of Tefnakht	Athens, Agora, Late Geometric pyxis	Argos, Heraion, West pediment, Head of Hera	Sais, Temple of Neith, Statuette
Thebes, Tombstone	Athens, Temple of Zeus, Portrait of Polemo of Laodicea	Eleusis, Temple F, Cecrops and Herse	Eleusis, Tombstone of a warrior
Eleusis, Relief of Demeter, Triptolemus, and Kore	Piraeus, Votive stela of a reclining Dionysus	Epidauros, Temple of Artemis, Nike	Hellenistic ruler
Larisa, Tombstone of a man with a hat	Athens, Kerameikos, Alexander with a Lion's Pelt	Piraeus, Julian the Apostate	Piraeus, Theater, Head of Dionysus (classicizing)