Athens
The Parthenon has always been admired. Already, in 1674, Louis XIV, on hearing about the building, had asked the Marquis de Nointel and the painter Jacques Carrey to go to Athens and bring back sketches, sculptures of the sacred temple designed by Phidias, today exhibited at the National Library of Paris. But the Parthenon, like the three other temples of the rock of the Acropolis, which assume the identity of Athens, feels very lonely at the moment.
"I can't wait to climb the steep path that leads to this 5th century sanctuary, to feel welcomed by the goddess Athena, and to share this moment of euphoria with visitors," confides Angélique Consolas, archaeologist and tour guide. The archaeological sites of the country reopened well on May 18, and yet tourists are not yet there. The pandemic will have been right in André Malraux's speech of May 28, 1959. The French Minister of Culture, who came to inaugurate the enlightenment
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