The Peloponnese: the back story

About The Peloponnese: the back story

By the ULTIMATE Athens Editorial Team

The Peloponnese is a large peninsula in southern Greece, joined to the mainland only by the narrow Isthmus of Corinth. Its name means the island of Pelops, after a hero of Greek myth, and few places on earth hold so many famous names: Mycenae, Epidaurus, Olympia, Sparta, Corinth. All of them are within a few hours of Athens.

The isthmus

For travellers from Athens, the Peloponnese begins at the Isthmus of Corinth, a strip of land only a few kilometres wide between the Saronic Gulf and the Gulf of Corinth. In ancient times, ships were hauled across it on the diolkos, a paved slipway, and the emperor Nero began digging a canal in AD 67, but the work was abandoned. The modern Corinth Canal was finally cut between 1881 and 1893: about 6.4 kilometres long and only around 20 metres wide at sea level, between sheer walls of rock up to about 80 metres high. Standing on the bridge and looking straight down is one of the great sights of a journey south.

Just beyond lies Ancient Corinth, one of the richest cities of the ancient world, with its 6th-century BC Temple of Apollo. St Paul lived and preached here, and above the city rises Acrocorinth, a huge rock crowned by the walls of a fortress used for more than two thousand years.

Few places on earth hold so many famous names, and all of them are within a few hours of Athens.

Mycenae and the age of heroes

In the Argolid, the plain south of Corinth, stands Mycenae, the citadel that gave its name to a whole civilisation of the Late Bronze Age. In Homer’s poems it was the kingdom of Agamemnon, leader of the Greeks at Troy. Its walls are built of stones so huge that later Greeks believed they had been raised by giants, the Cyclopes, and visitors still enter through the Lion Gate, carved more than 3,000 years ago. Heinrich Schliemann’s excavations here in 1876 uncovered royal graves full of gold.

Nearby, the Sanctuary of Asklepios at Epidaurus was the most famous healing centre of the ancient Greek world, and its theatre, built in the 4th century BC, is renowned for its remarkable acoustics: it is said that a coin dropped in the centre can be heard from the top rows. On summer evenings it still hosts performances of ancient drama in the Athens & Epidaurus Festival.

Sparta and the Peloponnesian War

In the south, in the valley of the Evrotas river, lay Sparta, the greatest military power of ancient Greece. Spartan boys were trained from childhood to be soldiers, and in 480 BC King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans made their famous stand against the Persian army at Thermopylae. In 431 BC, Sparta and its allies went to war with Athens and its empire. The Peloponnesian War, recorded by the historian Thucydides, lasted until 404 BC and ended with the defeat of Athens.

Ancient Sparta left few monuments, and the modern town was laid out in 1834. A few kilometres away, on a steep hill, stands Mystras, a Byzantine city of churches, monasteries and palaces, whose frescoes are among the finest in Greece.

Olympia

In the green west of the Peloponnese, in a valley shaded by pine trees, lies Olympia, the sanctuary of Zeus where the ancient Olympic Games were held every four years, traditionally from 776 BC. Its temple once housed the great gold and ivory statue of Zeus by Phidias, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and you can still walk through the stone tunnel into the stadium where the athletes raced. Today the flame for every modern Olympic Games is lit here, at the Temple of Hera.

Nafplio, castles and coast

Nafplio, on the Argolic Gulf, is one of the most beautiful towns in Greece, with Venetian and Ottoman houses, marble-paved streets and the Bourtzi castle on its little island in the harbour. From 1829 to 1834 it was the first capital of modern Greece, and above it the Palamidi fortress is reached by a long stairway said to have 999 steps. Further south, the rock town of Monemvasia, joined to the land by a causeway, and the stone tower houses of the Mani are among the most atmospheric places in the country.

Visiting from Athens

Corinth is about an hour from Athens by car, Nafplio and Mycenae about two hours, and Olympia and Sparta around three. You can see the Corinth Canal, Mycenae, Epidaurus and Nafplio on a long day trip, but the Peloponnese deserves more: with three or four days you can add Olympia, Sparta and Mystras, and with a week, Monemvasia and the Mani.

Our advice: hire a car if you can, start early to reach the big sites before the tour buses and the midday heat, and buy tickets for the archaeological sites online. Stay a night or two in Nafplio, which makes a perfect base for the Argolid, and in summer bring a hat and water: there is little shade at Mycenae or Epidaurus.

Through the years

Ancient dates are traditional or approximate; check site opening times before you travel.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with The Peloponnese: the back story before you go.