Kolonos

History

Kolonos takes its name from a statue of the hero Colonus that once stood on this hill in ancient Attica -- the "Hippios Kolonos" (Equestrian Colonus) that Sophocles called the most aristocratic deme of ancient Athens and used as the setting of his tragedy Oedipus at Colonus. Lying in the plain of the river Kifissos about 2km north of the ancient Dipylon gate, the hill held a temple of Hippios Poseidon (destroyed in 265 BC), an altar to Hippia Athena, a sanctuary of the Erinyes, and was traditionally held to be the burial place of Oedipus, Theseus, Pirithous and Adrastus. Plato founded his philosophical school, the Academy, on the plain just northwest of the hill in 387 BC -- the neighbouring district is still called Akadimia Platonos, and the ancient gymnasium's remains are now an archaeological park. In the 19th century Kolonos hill became a burial ground for European philhellene scholars: German archaeologist Karl Otfried Muller was buried there in 1840 under a marble stele designed by Christian Hansen, and a marble hydria erected in 1936 (sculptor Michalis Tombros) holds the heart of French archaeologist Charles Lenormant. The district industrialized in the 20th century around the Public Tobacco Factory (built 1927, operating 1930-1978, employing some 3,000 workers) and the nearby Larissa railway station, and was built up densely during the 1960s-70s construction boom.

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