Greece’s East Attica In Antiquity: Playground Of Gods, Heroes And Heroines
The seductive scenery along the east coast of Attica in Greece overlooking the Aegean Sea, easily lures one back to an era when mythical gods and goddesses still claimed the land and implored their heroes to build temples for them and their heroines to serve in their sanctuaries as priestesses. During the Mycenaean Bronze Age era, Attica comprised of 12 small communities; Cecropia, Tetrapolis, Epacria, Decelea, Eleusis, Aphidna, Thorikos, Brauron, Kytheros, Sphettus, Cephisia, and Phaleron. Thucydides, a fifth-century BC Athenian general and historian, relates that Theseus, one of the legendary founder kings of Athens, through the process of synoikismos, united Attica’s 12 ancient settlements within Athens’ rule.
Primitive Acropolis with the Pelargikon (Pelasgic Wall) and the Old Temple of Athena (Public Domain)
After Theseus had slain the Minotaur on Crete and relieved Athens from the hegemony of King Minos, he returned to Athens. His return was not without a tragedy that happened at Sounion, the southernmost tip of the Attica peninsula. Nevertheless, Theseus thus became rightful tenth King of Athens. During the Late Bronze Age, the Acropolis of Athens was defended by a Cyclopean circuit wall, similar to that of Tiryns and Mycenae. None of the fifth-century BC buildings – initiated by Pericles after the Peloponnesian Wars – existed yet, but there was a megaron on top of the sacred rock. As the new king, Theseus founded a central Prytaneion, to facilitate the governing administrative duties of the synoikismos. (Modern historians consider it more likely that the 12 communities were progressively incorporated into an Athenian state during the Dark Ages (eighth to seventh centuries BC.)
