funky called vergina

another bright shiny sunday and the erasmus gang had the pleasure to visit the archaeological area of vergina, the first capital of the macedonian kingdom. it was put on map when the archaeological excavations brought to light the acropolis, parts of the city’s walls, the palace, the temple and the cemetery in 1977/78.

our greek guide first showed us the excavated ruins of the ‘palace of aegae’ – quite a nice little ‘cottage’ as it seems – with a fabulous view over the surrounding landscape. philip the II. (father of alexander the great) used to stroll around these walls before he was assassinated by one of his bodyguards – on the way to his daughters wedding party (what a day!?) near the amphitheatre – which was our second point of interest.

somehow these old times sound like the perfect shakespearian drama. with a lot of betrayal, brutality and blood. (by the way: no one knows why the king has been assassinated as the assassinator was assassinated right after the assassination! our guide presumed that the king’s wife might have been involved…for further information see shakespeare: “frailty thy name is woman”!??)

so we had a look at the monumental royal graves which are the final resting place for the murdered king philip, the murdered 13(?) years old prince and the body of a woman presumably the wife of the king. no cameras were allowed there, so I’m afraid I won’t be able to show you any pictures. but I can tell you it was a lot of gold, silk, ivory and other valuable stuff. that is why some grave robbers were really mad about ‘visiting’ this place. and that is why there were found some more than just the royal bones in these graves in turn. apparently it didn’t pay off for them!

for us the visit certainly paid off. we can now better imagine what these ancient macedonian times looked like and how the people then used to admire their great leaders.

after the visit to vergina, our busses carried us to st. nikolas of naousa which is a bright green place in the middle of the woods with a lot of little rivers and plane trees. of course there were some little taverns, too, where we sat down and had our desperatly needed lunch and amstel beer. not to forget: in winter there’s a lift nearby to reach the 2005 meter high ski area. preferring watersports I don’t think I will be using it…

here now the pictures...: