Destinations: Sounion, Greece

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Who cares if summertime Athens is crowded, noisy and full of honking cars? It has the Acropolis, with its proud temple to Athena, the Parthenon. And it’s just a short distance from the seaside splendor of Sounion.

Traveling to Sounion has taken on the nature of a pilgrimage to me. Only 40 miles from Athens, Sounion looks over the southernmost tip of Attica, to the Aegean Sea on one side and the Saronic Gulf on the other. Peaceful and beautiful, its summer sunsets are breathtaking, attracting hundreds of visitors each night. And then, of course, there are the magnificent ruins of the Temple of Poseidon, god of the sea, overlooking the water.

Sounion’s history stretches back a long way. Prehistoric tombs from the third millennium B.C. have been found nearby. In the Odyssey, written around the eighth century B.C., Homer mentions “holy Sounion, Athens’ headland” (Book III: 316). In the seventh century B.C., temples to Poseidon and Athena were constructed near each other on this high promontory.

It seems appropriate that the god of the sea, who in anger brought so many trials upon Odysseus, should be honored here at the point where two bodies of water merge, often turbulently. Sailors of old must have looked up to the Temple of Poseidon, atop its cliff, and prayed for safe passage around the cape.

The Persian army razed most of the buildings and sanctuaries at Cape Sounion in 480 B.C., but a new temple to the sea god was erected by Pericles (461–429 B.C.). Constructed in 444 B.C., the extant Temple of Poseidon is a magnificent colonnaded structure built in the same classical style as the Parthenon, which was completed 12 years later. Archaeologists believe that the temple was designed by the unknown master architect responsible for the Theseion of Athens and the Temple of Nemesis at Rhamnus.

In its original form, the Temple of Poseidon boasted 34 marble columns, 16 of which are still standing. When I first visited Sounion many years ago, it was still possible to walk inside the sanctuary and search for the anta (pilaster) where the English poet Lord Byron had carved his name in 1810—though today the public is not allowed to enter the temple itself.

Byron loved Sounion and returned there often. At that time, Greece was part of the Ottoman empire and Byron lent his poetry to the independence movement. Recalling the days of Grecian glory, the English romantic poet wrote that he preferred a death-leap from Sounion to life as a Turkish slave:

Place me on Sounion’s

marble steep,

Where nothing, save the

waves and I,

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May hear our mutual

murmurs sweep:

There, swan-like, let me

sing and die:

A land of slaves shall

ne’er be mine—

Dash down yon cup of

Samian wine!

Although most visitors today head straight for the temple’s main colonnade, Poseidon’s sanctuary is actually surrounded by a host of other interesting structures. Hardly anything remains of the propylaia (main gateway) of the temple complex, but an outer wall surrounding the sanctuary can still be traced; so can the stoa (portico) that ran along the north and west sides of the temple complex. Temple visitors would have used the stoa as protection from the intense sun, the driving rain and—perhaps most importantly—the stinging wind that often whips across the promontory. During the Peloponnesian War (431–404 B.C), the Athenians built a series of fortifications around the sanctuary and neighboring buildings, and some of these walls are still visible.

About 1,600 feet from the temple, on the top of a low hill, perch the remains of a fifth-century temple to Athena. Its setting is not nearly as spectacular as that of Poseidon’s temple; but it seems only fair that Poseidon should have pride of place here, by the sea, while Athena, the goddess of wisdom, presides over the ancient enlightened city named after her.

It was mid-winter when I took my most recent pilgrimage to Sounion. The day was cloudy and blustery, especially close to shore. As evening approached, only a dozen or so people gathered on the rocks at the base of the temple—bundled up against the wind and hoping for a glimpse of the sun behind the clouds. The wind suddenly died down. The clouds parted, and the sun set in a final blaze of yellow, orange and red. Poseidon’s smile?

Who cares if summertime Athens is crowded, noisy and full of honking cars? It has the Acropolis, with its proud temple to Athena, the Parthenon. And it’s just a short distance from the seaside splendor of Sounion. Traveling to Sounion has taken on the nature of a pilgrimage to me. Only 40 miles from Athens, Sounion looks over the southernmost tip of Attica, to the Aegean Sea on one side and the Saronic Gulf on the other. Peaceful and beautiful, its summer sunsets are breathtaking, attracting hundreds of visitors each night. And then, of course, there are the magnificent […]