Agrigento

We took a bus in to the temple complex of Agrigento this morning. The Temple of Concord is the first temple you visit. Although it isn’t complete, you still get a pretty good idea of what this impressive structure probably looked like in its heyday. Built to honor a Greek goddess (there's some dispute over which one), this magnificent temple is not as impressive as the one that follows--the temple of Concordia. The temple of Concordia is truly impressive. Our guide, Luigi, tells me that this temple is intact and almost exactly as it was in the 400 BC. Minimal restoration has been done on this lovely structure. After the Greeks, Christians modified it to suit their needs; the walls are still visible in the interior. Later we visited the temple of Zeus, which was mostly in ruins. The really fascinating part of the ruins, however, was the reconstruction of a towering statue. Although this statue was laying down, archaelogists claim that they were contructed to stand upright between the columns, and they stood at least 20ft high! The archaelogical museum of Agrigento is impressive as well. Luigi explained that many of the vessels portrayed scenes from Greek mythology; mostly of the Gods falling in love. Very romantic!