What not to do when you're bored at Corinth: Walk to Sikyon

It's Sunday here in Columbus and I was trying to find something adventurous to do. After a bit of interwebbing I realized that the Historical Society is closed and anything from their website that sparked my interest also seems to be inaccessible. It's raining today and foggy, so it's really not a good day for biking around town and playing Investigator. Here I am with all this creative and inquiring energy to spend and nothing to do with it.

This state of affairs recalled to my memory a long Saturday this past summer at Corinth, when Dan Leon and I were desperate to get out of dodge. So desperate, in fact, we decided to go Topograph-ing (Yes, I just made that word up).

One thing I learned about archaeologists while at the American School is that they like to wander aimlessly around the countryside, investigating 'topography.' Of course, when an archaeologist is aimlessly wandering, they are actually, you know, looking at stuff. Sherding. Learning things. Observing hills and dells and ravines and flood plains and stream beds. They're seeing archaeological sites of the future. Processing historical possibilities. They are doing a mystical activity utterly foreign to people of my generation - Learning The Lay of The Land. (Note: this is why archaeologists tend to play such vital roles in wartime).

So at Corinth (and Greece at large) there's an archaeologists' tradition of making 'treks' off to other towns in imitation of 'treks' made in antiquity: Corinth to Nemea, Corinth to Kleonai, Corinth to Mycenae, etc. In Hill House (the Corinth Dig House), there's a folder with records of past archaeological escapades of the sort. The main actors are usually Ron Stroud and John Camp, and their notes record extraordinary details - what olive grove they turned left at, how many minutes exactly did it take to proceed down the slope, what dirt road has now overgrown and is no longer passable. That sort of stuff. They're great historical documents - and consciously so. Meanwhile, as the years pass, those hikes have become the stuff of legends.

Anyways. In the early 2000s some students decided to re-live the glory of the Stroud-Campian expeditions and left their own detailed notes, but with social commentary (on each other) and with descriptions of all the debacles included. So, not only is there a rich oral tradition about these walks passed down by people like Guy Sanders and Charles Williams, but there is also a growing collection of textual evidence beefing up Hill House's material culture. It sits there on the Corinth library table, staring at you, reminding you that other people, once, were not so lazy.

So Dan and I decided we were going to make our own walk. We weren't going to just rehash the Stroud-Campian Days, but we were going to boldly turn towards the heights of Sikyon, a place growing in mystique and aura ever since Guy first introduced it to us in the autumn days of the year. We did the appropriate research, asking advice of Guy and James and Iulia, consulting maps, squinting over satellite images, scribbling down as much as we could on scrap papers that we packed into our bags with snacks and water and various other contingency items. We got up early, when the light was still kind and soft, and left at 7am.

Woooo! Here we go!

I think I had a specific vision in my head of what the trip would be like. All the tales I'd heard abounded with dirt tracks meandering through olive groves, little ravines and quaint bridges, mustachioed farmers on slow donkeys, melting mudbrick shacks and overgrown structures. But instead of going inland, where those things abide in all directions, we went down into the Corinthinan plain, towards the coast, where an enormous impassable highway slices the landscape in half, and concrete town after concrete town follows one after another. I think Dan remembers our Corinthia hike with a more measured cast, but for me, it was a day that started with a beautiful morning's promise and turned into a sweltering stone hell. But I get ahead of myself. Here's how it went:

A beautiful morning with Akrocorinth and the excavation house far in the distance. Ah, the freedom of the open countryside and our own two feet!

Okay, we made it about 30 minutes before we started getting lost. Crappy printed maps from Google work in theory, but no so much in practice.

We saw a lot of dogs. We were barked at, alot.

We passed a rabbit farm. I guess this is where all those tasty rabbit dinners come from.

We went from town to town, moving through the rural patches, empty lots and suburban monotony. It was June 20th and, as the day grew on, it got hotter and hotter. The asphalt stretched forever. Fumes and truck exhaust engulfed us. The sensation I remember most strongly was the aching of my feet after hours of hiking on the unforgiving road surface. A whimpy whine began to grow in my throat.


We got remarkably lost in Assos. No one - seriously, no one - knew how to get to Sikyon (modern Vasiliko) when we asked in our meagre Greek. It was noon-ish, we were halfway there, and our will was flagging. Finally we found a corner store that pointed us in the right direction and gave us free water. It was like an oasis of beauty in the depths of the harshest desert. We ate lunch with our feet hanging into the concrete drain on the edge of the road.

Help us find the way! Please!

Near the end we returned for a bit to rural life, but never a cushioning dirt road for our feet. We passed by several enormous gypsy camps.

By this time, I was very difficult to be around, truly surly. Poor Dan.

Finally reaching Sikyon required climbing an enormous hill with a zig-zagging road that nearly did me in. But we were almost there, almost to Sikyon itself, where we would collapse into chairs at a shady taverna and eat enormous quantities of Greek food. We could pretend we were ancient people arriving from Corinth to see the great artists and sculptors of famous Sikyon. Yes!

Except that in actuality, Sikyon has nothing. And there aren't any tavernas. No restaurants at all that we could find. That is, NO FOOD after walking for 8 hours and well over 12 miles. Sure, we did pass two packed cafeneios (watering-holes for dudes only). There were no women in sight. At this stage we were desperate for sustenance, but found none. The archaeological sites were closed; there was really nothing, in the end, at Sikyon for us. No food, no archaeology, no charming corners, only bone-deep weariness.

Dan was a trooper and entered a small convenience store to ask if they could call us a taxi. Calling a taxi entailed walking out to the street and yelling down to the cafeneio, "Giorgo, are you working today?" Giorgo was not working. We had to call the nearest city and have them send a cab out for us, which then zipped us back the way we'd come, straight back to Ancient Corinth and the fastest, most satisfying taverna food we could find. 8 hours and 12 miles undone in half an hour.

Apparently there was a reason no one at Hill House had walked to Sikyon before us. Well, we tried. We made it without dying. And it was a learning experience. I learned that I am no good at Topograph-ing in beautiful charming countryside like Denver Graninger is - instead I am a pro at Topograph-ing on concrete and in traffic. Somebody's got to do it, I guess. Or could it be that, in the end, Dan and I were just two more grad students trying our damnedest to be like Ron Stroud and John Camp, and failing miserably? At least it's a good story, and we laugh about it now, and it allowed us to get out of the House. And perhaps we can insert ourselves into the oral history of walks-gone-wrong; maybe I should print this out and add it to the Hill House Folder, as a guide for how not to walk to Sikyon.

Syrup, of one form or another

I've been in Corinth the last week and a half so I have a been a bit slow on the blog front. I have some ideas banging around in my head, but need time to actually write them out. Plus, I am STILL transcribing an interview with a member of the 1959-60 Regular Year.

I'm here participating in the Corinth excavations, where we are working on a Frankish/Byzantine area of the site. The days are long, which leaves little time for thinking hard about anything other than deposits, fills, cuts, wells, robbing trenches, foundations, etc. And I'm not joking - I'm having freaky archaeological dreams every night.

There's a lot to learn about the history of Corinth and the excavations, much of it institutional, but more of it as 'oral history.' I'm working on it, but for now, here's a little story.

Corinth doesn't have tea hour (we have mid-morning snack, instead). Like at Loring, it does have ouzo hour at 7pm:



Ouzo is served, believe it or not, in a Mrs. Butterworth glass bottle.



This is actually a long-standing, 40 year old tradition. Some 15-20 years ago the Butterworth Ouzo Bottle got dropped and shattered - major party foul! A new one was purchased; the one we have now is about two decades old.


Woe to the person who drops this Mrs. Butterworth bottle- they've gone out of print.

Step Off, Steps of Ancient Theatres in Turkey

Turkey has a lot of ancient sites. And what it probably has more of than anything else, is steps. I feel like the only things I saw the whole time were ancient steps - steps of a stadium, steps of a bouleuterion, steps carved into bedrock. Most abundant, of course, were the steps of theatres. I am dreaming steps.

The Turkey Trip has been going since the 1980s. Of course, long before then it had been a tradition for Regular Members to take off for foreign parts as soon as the seminars ended, often travelling in groups. John Camp didn't lead the first 'Optional Trip' to Turkey, but he took it up just a year or two after. That was around 1984-5-6. Here it is, 2009. That's a lot of Turkey trips. While we were recently there for 2 weeks, we covered over 4,000 km. If you do the math, you will see that the peeps of the American School of Classical Studies (at Athens) have covered an enormous amount of ground in that particular country.

And they have come across a lot of theatres. Ionia, Caria, etc. are marked by a large number of cities founded in the Hellenistic period, and all of those cities had to have a place for the magic of the stage. What's horrible is that they all have started to blend together in my memory. I just remember steps and steps and steps. Here's a sample of what we saw:

The well-preserved theatre of Priene.

The wet theatre of Magnesia-on-Meander.

The gigantic theatre at Ephesos.

The theatre seats at Alinda, uprooted by olive trees.

Stratonikeia.

The theatre at Miletus, right before it filled up with about 100 teenage boys on a field trip.

The super-tall theatre at Pergamon.

The overgrown theatre at Notion.

Jennifer Neils shows off the theatre at the Asklepion of Pergamon.

And of course, best of all, take a look at the theatre of Iasos. Almost nothing remains, but the shape of the structure, cut into the hill, is entirely clear. Look to the cows.

I'm getting twitchy just thinking about it. That's a lot of ancient theatres.

ASCSA Art 2: Edward Lear's Watercolors and Landscapes

We spend a lot of time in the dining room, where the watercolors of Piet de Jong hang in frames from invisible thread. The Saloni, however, is pretty much where everything important happens in Loring Hall: tea, ouzo, after dinner coffee, hang out sessions, Loeb reading, tea talks, etc. So what art decorates the walls? More watercolors, actually. These are not by an archaeologist, however, but are by Edward Lear.

Who was Edward Lear, you ask? Lear (1812-1888) was a famous British comic poet, limerick writer and illustrator. He was, in fact, a lauded writer of ‘nonsense,’ his most recognizable titles being A Book of Nonsense and The Owl and the Pussycat. Literary nonsense, Wikipedia propounds, is a “style or motif in literature that plays with the conventions of language and the rules of logic and reason via sensical and non-sensical elements.” It’s what we expect from Lewis Carroll and Dr. Seuss. It’s emphasis on the fantastical, unusual and absurd has had quite an impact on the genre of fantasy literature and its champions like JRR Tolkien. It has also been argued that nonsense literature like that of Edward Lear contains a hidden but overwhelming potential for philosophical theory and inquiry.

Lear, when he wasn’t tutoring Queen Victoria, spent his time in Italy and in Greece, producing large quantities of watercolors. In the 1920s, the Gennadion library was fortunate enough to purchase some 200 of his watercolors (for 25 English pounds!). In 1971-2, Lear’s paintings were on exhibit in the US, and when they came back, several of them went on the wall in the Saloni. That is, the prints went up, not just in Loring Hall, but sprinkled throughout the American School’s buildings.

His quick and spontaneous paintings employ a sparse use of color (usually only a few tones) and the squiggly outlines so well-loved in his ‘nonsense’ work.

They depict desolate locations or include strategically placed locals. Antiquities and ruins are rare, and when they do appear, they seem to be regulated to evocative spots in the background (at least in those that I have seen). So what art historical analysis can I come up with about the content and context of these replicas?

1) They are copies of works owned by the American School and therefore reinforce, celebrate and advertise the School’s collection.

2) They depict a topic much beloved by the School’s decorator, the landscapes of historical Greece. After all, both Piet de Jong and Edward Lear did extremely quirky, colorful and amusing work, but it is the muted landscapes that we have framed and hanging up. This subject matter is one of the more popular in the School buildings, for probably many reasons. First, it is a reminder of a simpler, pastoral, more romantic time or place. No pictures of bustling Athens here. Second, a lot of them evoke the experiences of the early Western travelers in Greece, whom many archaeologists see as our discipline’s grandparents. Third, they emphasize the School’s connection to Greece, its appreciation of the country’s recent history, and thus in a round-about way, it’s street cred. I mean street cred in the way 1) a rock n’ roll hipster wears a Johnny Cash shirt to show that she knows her stuff and 2) to emphasize that the School really does LIKE Greece, not just its antiquities (note that I have not yet come across any pictures of the Blue Ridge Mountains or Amber Fields of Grain anywhere in the School artwork).

3) Somehow, the two artists who most decorate Loring’s walls, Edward Lear and Piet de Jong, are British. Curses. Edit: An art historical approach would talk about how the choice of two British artists stresses American ties to the Mother Country while also reiterating the international nature of the archaeological community in Greece, the fluid boundaries between foreign archaeological schools, etc etc. I tend to think, however, that this was purely coincidence.

BSA Carnival

So last night was the annual Carnival party at the British School at Athens. The BSA and us go way back, to the 1880s in fact. The American School was founded in 1881 and the BSA in 1886. When we moved to our new digs here in Kolonaki a while back, the ASCSA and the BSA decided to be neighbors. In fact, when it came time to buy the land for Loring Hall, we split the cost (and the land) with the Brits. Of course, when we got hot water in 1930, they were just getting electricity - booyah!

Nowadays, we're virtually on the same land, sharing the gardens and the tennis courts. When I look out my window, I look directly at the British School. There's a long tradition of people strolling back and forth across the street from the BSA to ASCSA, whether for tea, ouzo, lectures, or other social/work occasions (Piet de Jong being a prime example). We also have access to each other's library (even sharing the same library catalogue), which is really handy, given that I'm always looking for books that only the BSA library has. For a while I found their library terrifying, since I always got lost in it, but now that I have (finally!) figured out where the little library maps are, I feel like I'm straight out of London.

I don't know when the tradition began, but at some point in time we started the alternating party thing - we do Halloween, they do Carnival. Last night was the BSA's much anticipated party, which had the theme of 'Down Under.' I didn't hang around too long, since I had Harry Potter to read and went home a little after midnight. Apparently the festivities lasted well into the nighttime, and there were several surly looking people shuffling around Loring at noon today, having just gotten out of bed.

So thanks to the British School for throwing a great party (with great decorations)! Here's how a few of us Americans participated in the theme:

Fosters - Australian for Beer, Boxing Kangaroo, and Dreya with some boingy flowerythings.

Crikey and Criminal.

Dingo a la Elaine from Seinfeld.

Any guesses?

Birthday Party to Loring Hall!

Today is February 11, 2009. Loring Hall has officially been open for 79 years. I say officially, but not in practice, because in the fall of 1929, after the Fall Trips had ended, people began slowing trickling in to the brand-new building, some in December and some in January of 1930. Lucy Shoe Merrit was one of those. I’ve already reported some of her thoughts on Loring Hall, but my favorite of her descriptions was the one about the ‘Grand Opening’ of Loring, which occurred on February 11, 1930, from 5-7pm. She’d apparently kept a diary while at the School, so her letter in 1981 contained a lot of wonderful details.

Apparently over 300 people came, and it wasn’t just members of the School community, but dignitaries, some of the leading families in Greece, archaeologists and foreign diplomats. There was a huge spread and the students were in charge of showing the guests around; the things that were most popular among the guests were the metal furniture, the bathrooms and the kitchen. The guests kept opening all the drawers and playing with the aluminum utensils in the kitchen (which annoyed the cook; he preferred his copper stuff and was unimpressed by the aluminum). It seems that the bathtubs were extremely popular as well; in Greece in 1930, being able to turn on a tap and get hot water at any time of the day or night was entirely miraculous. Funny that hot water is still an issue in Loring today. You can get wonderful scalding showers at certain times of the day, but if it’s a bit cold outside, prepare yourself for pain.

The day after the Grand Opening, because it was such a special occasion, Lucy Shoe and her compatriots ‘dressed’ for dinner. That is, they wore evening dresses and tuxes. To dinner in Loring Hall. Fancy. Shoe commented that back in the day you actually ‘dressed’ for special occasions. There’s some very revealing information about the School population in that statement: most School members were wealthy enough to own a tux, and to bring it to Greece with them. This can be contrasted with the situations of other people at the School whose letters I have read. For one man, in the early 1900s, the topic of money was a frequent one in letters home to his family. He would constantly refer to how much he spent on lunch, how much it cost to get his clothes cleaned, and when he was able to get a great deal on various meals.

Anyways, Happy 79th Birthday to Loring Hall. May there be many more to come.

A Report on Christmas Break, And So Begins the Winter Quarter

The Christmas holidays have finally come to a close, and I really am back in the blogosphere (did I just actually say ‘blogosphere?’). Our Fall Quarter here at the School ended with a six-day trip to Crete, amidst a whirlwind of seminars, paper run-throughs and efforts to avoid nervous break downs. We got into the holiday spirit by having two tree trimming parties here in Athens, one at the Director’s House and one in Lorring Hall. There was even carol singing, believe it or not, accompanied on the piano by the Assistant Director of the British School, Robert Pitt.

Lorring Hall’s tree trimming party.

Regular Members Tom Garvey and Sean Jensen.

I went back to the States for a much needed month-long vacation, although it turned out to be extremely busy and involved a lot of driving all over the East Coast.

My driving route.

I went to Atlanta for 10 days or so and was able to eat lots of banana pudding and watch tons of Battlestar Galactica with my mom. I also visited Beast Cat and was taught to crochet by my grandmother.

Note the fancy new hat and scarf my grandma made me.

I spent Christmas on a mountaintop in Tennessee and played lots of Wii. Then back to Atlanta.

Yes, I got a cowboy hat for Christmas. I’m thinking it might make a good excavation hat.

I spent a few days around New Years in DC, before heading to Columbus, then on to Philadelphia for the AIA Meetings. Made the 12 hour trip back to Atlanta before taking a 24 hour flight back to Athens on Wednesday. We had a truly lovely morning yesterday, visiting the inside of the Parthenon. The day was gorgeous and warm, and our tour of the Parthenon was interesting while being sufficiently laid back.

‘Chillaxing’ on the steps of the Parthenon.

Today I gave my first site report of the quarter at Eleusis. I presented the Telesterion, the main cult building in the sanctuary and supposedly the site of the mysterious Mysteries of Demeter and Persephone.

Note so mysterious in the daylight, missing the spooky torches and secret rites. Imagine us sitting on the steps, wet and bedraggled from the early rain storm, with wet handouts plastered to our clothing.

And now, as soon as I finish this Fellowship application, the weekend awaits! I plan on enjoying it via a good vegetation session on the couch.

American Holidays: Football and Thanksgiving at Loring

Traditions are an important thing at a place like the American School. And one of the major traditions of the year seems to be Thanksgiving dinner. There’s something about being away from home that makes one really, really appreciate those sentimental holidays even more so than usual. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so touched by the Fourth of July until I spent it in Greece the summer after Sept. 11th: never was ‘Take Me Home, Country Roads’ sung with such fervor. This year, there was a great deal of excitement leading up to the Thanksgiving holiday. In fact, I found myself doing little tap dances inside whenever I thought about the approaching turkey.

Most of all, though, was the little electrical currents tingling about in anticipation of, you guessed it, football. The dudes kept talking longingly of the NFL (three games!) and how we could swing some Pay-per-view to watch it live overseas. But it wasn’t just the watching of the football that we were looking forward to, but the playing of it. Weeks in advance the Thanksgiving Day game was planned, with intrepid Associate Members exploring the wilds of Greek sporting goods stores in search of the elusive, cherished, and mythical American football. (One was discovered, at the cost of 34 euros. Ouch.)

Luckily, Sherry Fox’s sons had one that we could borrow, so the horde moved out just after noon on Thursday towards the one open space in Kolonaki. Alas, it was already occupied by a soccer game – this resulted in us playing (a little nervously) in an empty lot next to the US Embassy. Here are some highlights:

Hut hut hike. That’s me in the red sweat band.

The girls were team captains. That was a nice change – I seem to recall always getting picked last in elementary school.

Fortunately, there were two girls playing, so I wasn’t totally clobbered by the guys. Of course, witness here the stiff arm I’m receiving from Christina Gieske. Actually, please notice how this is the most awesome action shot ever taken (click to enlarge). Nathan Harper (in the green) is at full tilt, while Sean Jensen sprints toward the action. Note especially Denver Graninger’s enthusiastic pose behind us, with the dedicated exertion of the other players.

And speaking of enthusiastic action, here’s a Hail Mary.

Sean Jenson QBs. He actually played college ball at one time in the past, evident in his spectacular form.

It was a totally awesome two hours. It also resulted in some very sore and cranky people wandering around Loring Hall today, people who thought they were still fit and young but now realize that they’re not 18 anymore.

The main event for Thanksgiving here is, of course, the food. The entire School is invited to attend dinner, and this year 98 people decided to show up in their holiday best. We had ten tables, but rumor has it there were 17 turkeys. The event was organized by Shari and Jack Davis, who did a really fantastic job and ensured that I sat at the table with not only John Cherry but Sir John Boardman as well.

My table, with John Cherry and John Boardman at the end; alas, just a little too far down the table for me to be able to talk to either of them over stuffing.

The day was seriously full of food, since dinner (at 3:30) sort of bled into a party in the Saloni with three different series of baked goods made by my football nemesis Christina. Unfortunately there was no NFL to be had, but just to make everyone feel better, a college game from last week went up on the big screen. Then there was a dance party.

So Thanksgiving revolved around overindulging and an overdose of social interaction, which is just as it should be. As Tom Garvey notes, the night devolved into three groups of people: one singing folk songs on the porch, one dancing to ‘Rump Shaker’ in the Saloni, and the last group standing in the kitchen, STILL eating.

And thus ended my first Thanksgiving at the School. Good thing there's a pig roast scheduled for today, to ensure that the fun continues.