The Porch of the Caryatids
The figures holding up this roof are all replicas with the orginals being in the nearby museum. This porch is part of a building called the "Erechtheion". If you remember some of the cathedral sites we visited in Italy, there was, of course, the cathedral which was the main religious building, but there would also be a separate Baptistry building and another structure for the bell tower. At this Ancient Greek religious site, the Parthenon was the main religious temple but the Erechtheion was built for the performance of the many rituals necessary for honoring the gods. Inside the Greeks kept the remains of some of their early kings, but more importantly the remains of the marks Poseidon's Trident was supposed to have made when he hurled it at the mountain. The olive tree that Athena gave to the grateful citizens who subsequently named the city after her was also stored here.
Greece achieved its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1829. During the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, it gradually added neighboring islands and territories, most with Greek-speaking populations. In Worl... ... read more 
