Theatre of Dionysus
The wooden bleachers in the Agora collapsed, so Athens moved its drama festival to this hillside — where Aeschylus performed, and the theatre eventually grew to hold 25,000.
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On the south slope of the Acropolis, this theatre began as a simple circular terrace in the mid-to-late sixth century BC, hosting the City Dionysia. By the fourth century BC, under the epistates Lycurgus, it held up to 25,000 spectators. It stayed in use through the Roman period, then decayed during the Byzantine era until nineteenth-century excavations brought it back to its current state.
What to look for
- The circular orchestra terrace — its polygonal masonry foundations, identified by excavator Wilhelm Dörpfeld, mark the archaic-period origin of the stage
- The centre of the orchestra, where an altar (thymele) likely stood
- The natural hillside slope that served as the original theatron before any stone seating existed
Located on the south slope of the Acropolis hill, reachable along the main Acropolis circuit path.
Theatre of Dionysus is one of 36 sights worth the detour in Athens, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Athens pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Athens
- ParthenonA temple built to celebrate a war victory that went on to become a church, a mosque, and a gunpowder depot — blown apart in 1687 and still being reassembled.
- Acropolis of AthensA flat-topped rock 150 m above the city where Pericles spent the 5th century BC erecting the buildings that still define Athens.
- Platonic Academy (Akadimia Platonos)Aristotle studied here for twenty years before leaving to found his own school — and the word "academy" has followed ever since.
- Classical AthensDemocracy was invented here in 508 BC — and it took a bribe at Delphi to get it started.
- Olympic Stadium Athens "Spyros Louis"Santiago Calatrava's white steel roof arches over the same track where Athens opened the 2004 Olympics — and hosted three Champions League finals.
- ErechtheionThe one Greek temple that broke every rule of classical architecture — and scholars still can't agree on what it was actually called.