Corinth

Corinth was a special place to visit, in part because we were able to see streets where the Apostle Paul walked and the platform or dias where he was acquitted by Proconsul Gallio after having been accused of false teaching. Our route to Corinth crossed the historic canal (shown below) that cuts through the Corinthian Peninsula. An engineering marvel in its day, the canal became obsolete as commercial vessels became larger and larger. More recently, a landslide effectively close the canal.

The archeological site of Corinth, like many other such sites, is only partially excavated, but parts of some of the larger structures still stand despite the ravages of wars and earthquakes over the centuries. Below is what is left of a major pagan temple, probably once dedicated to Zeus or Athena.

The archeological site hosts a relatively small but good museum, and the museum courtyard includes several headless statues from Roman times. These sculptures were designed to accommodate the carved images of the current emperor, governor, and other officials. When the current governor died, the authorities would pay an artist to carve the image of his replacement and position it on the headless statue. That saved the expense of carving an entire new statue every time there was a change in government. The modern day equivalent might be posting photos of our president in federal buildings and photos of our governor in state buildings. When a new official takes office, a new round of photos takes the place of the old ones. I will refrain from commenting about the most-wanted photos that used to adorn our US Post Offices.

Below you see statues of some of the Roman emperors, including Caesar at the left middle. The bust at the right is supposed to be a good likeness of Nero, complete with his large ears and scraggly beard.

The museum courtyard also displayed the types of column capitals used in Greek and Roman buildings. From left to right in the photo below, these include Doric, Ionic, Pergamene, Corinthian, and Chimeara capitals.

According to Acts 18:12-17, Corinthian Jews rose up against the Apostle Paul and brought him to trial before Gallio, the Roman proconsul. Before they could begin their accusations, Gallio refused to hear their case and set Paul free. The accusers then turned their anger on someone else, but Gallio refused to pay attention. The raised platform below, known as the Bema, was the site where Gallio met with Paul and his accusers and then announced the decision.

We were surprised to see a number of large stray dogs roaming some of the cities and towns in Greece and Turkey. They were neither hostile nor friendly, but sort of coexisted with the crowds and traffic. They were all about the size of the dog lounging at the base of the Bema, shown below. We also saw quite a few stray cats, but not much in the way of rats, mice, squirrels, or anything else that might attract attention from one of the dogs or cats roaming the area.