When you travel on a small boat, things like arriving and leaving can sometimes become flexible. A weather front came through and the Captain decided to stay in port cozied up to the dock rather than sail in bad weather. The upshot was we got extra time in Athens by skipping one port and heading straight there. The ship's entertainment staff worked overtime to produce some 'tours' in Athens at the last minute.
One of the tours was to the Benaki Museum. It has bunches of the traditional Greek treasures like black and orange pottery, but what I wanted to see was the Hellenistic Gold exhibition. (I had already marked it out as something I wanted to see even before we arrived.) The young flustered tour guide didn't care for my demand to see the exhibition, but I hardly allowed her displeasure at my request to bother me. Drake and I and another woman peeled off and went in search of the gold. We found the gatekeeper (aka the ticket seller to the special exhibition) and bought tickets for 7 euros each.
We walked into a large space filled with glass topped museum cases displaying exquisite beaten gold in many forms. I especially liked the leaves and flowers.
In addition to the Greek version of tiaras, there were pendants, necklaces, rings, earrings as well as some pieces of beaten gold fashioned into loose leaves. Something I'd never seen fashioned out of gold were the snoods. A snood is a net fashioned to be worn over a bun. It's a hair ornament that comes and goes in popularity over the centuries.
Sequins! |
While the pieces were extraordinary, I found the probable story of how all these precious objects came to be found to be the most interesting. Every item in this exhibition was found stuffed into a large buried amphora. Archeologists supposed this could indicate everything was owned by one person who buried the amphora to save the contents from being taken. Think Confederate women burying their silver to save it from the Yankees. In my opinion, this makes the discovery more personal and relatable. Imagine the woman who owned all of this, and what could have caused a burial to hide it all.
If you'd like to see the additional pieces hidden in the amphora, click on the pix.