[Hilary]

BARTHELEMY VICTOR RANTONNET:
A FORGOTTEN FRENCH GARDENER
BY Alison Rutherford

THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN number 59, January 2010
This article is illustrated with a drawing by Veronica Hadjiphani-Lorenzetti

I know I am repeating myself with the photos of Solanum rantonnetii but when I saw this article today while I was looking for something else, I couldn't resist the temptation to tell you about it.

[Hilary]

I laughed when I read the following
“How many adult children have moved out and left behind suitcases filled with things that might come in useful some day? If they haven't retrieved it to use it in five years, they do not truly need it. Give it back to them, re-gift it or get rid of it. No excuses tolerated, no recriminations or sulking accepted”
This in an article in THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN number 101, July 2020.
MANAGING BUSHFIRE RISK IN GARDENS IN MEDITERRANEAN-CLIMATE REGIONS: PART 1 by Trevor Nottle
The advice given applies to gardens, houses, garages, storerooms and places where rubbish and unwanted items collect.
I have realized that if you have the space you fill it. Now when our cupboards are overflowing, I am trying to offload somethings, but not very successfully, as I seem to be a hoarder.
In the 1960s small packets of sugar were provided with your coffee in Greece, I don't think sugar in individual packets had reached the coffee shops in the wilds of North East England at the time.
I loved these ones which depicted Greek wild flowers and, of course, collected as many as I could and stuck them in a scrap book, see they have now come in useful.

1 Primula vulgaris
2 Malva silvestris
3 Convolvulus elegantissimus

I am afraid I don't have a photo of the Convolvulus 

[Hilary]

MORE SUGAR PACKETS DEPICTING GREEK WILD FLOWERS

4 Cyclamen neapolitanum
5 Cistus salviaefolius
6 I don't seem to have this
7 Anemone pavonina

The only photo I have is of the Cistus

[Hilary]

THE LAST OF THE SUGAR PACKETS IN MY COLLECTION

8 Anemone blanda
9 I don't seem to have this
10 Malcolmia flexuosa
The only photo I have is of the Anemone
 

[Hilary]

Corfu 1966. Part one
Some photos scanned from slides of Corfu, 1966

I tried to find photos in my collection with some sort of Mediterranean vegetation   

There are many articles in THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN featuring Corfu. I suggest you read
 A MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN IN CORFU by Cali Doxiadis
I issue number 98, October 2019

There are photographs of this garden here 
http://www.mediterraneangardensociety.org/98-doxiades.html

[Hilary]

MORE VIEWS FROM CORFU

 How exotic I found the Canna lily, with the air strip behind it, and Prickly pear

Corfu is mentioned in many issues of THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN
You can read the article, and see stunning photographs, which is in number 93, July 2018,
CORFU GARDENS ANCIENT MYTH AND MODERN MAGIC by Rachel Weaving

http://www.mediterraneangardensociety.org/93-corfu.html

[Hilary]

The Theatre of Dionysos, Athens

The first photo was taken in Spring 1969

The second and third photos were taken in June 2009

There appear to be fewer trees in the later photos

There is even an article in THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN where the Theatre of Dionysos is mentioned, number 97, July 2019
ON THE ACROPOLIS: A RARE ENDEMIC by Caroline Harbouri

[Hilary]

OLIVE TREE ON THE ACROPOLIS

The first photo was taken on a very wet 10th October, in 1965
The second two photos were taken on a very hot sunny day in June 2009

Quoting from my old Travel Guide
“According to the legend, Athena and Poseidon disputed for the possession of Attica: Athena, in the name of the olive which she caused to spring up, Poseidon in the name of the nearby sea which he had made gush forth from the rock by touching it with his trident.”

“According to Pausanias, the sacred olive of Athena was not destroyed when the Persians fired the temple, (The Erechtheion) but on the morrow of the fire a new shoot sprang up, manifest proof of the protection of the goddess”

[Hilary]

THE TEMPLE OF OLYMPIAN ZEUS

I quote from my old guide book

“One enters the enclosure through the Doric propylaea: in the middle of it tower 15 magnificent Corinthian columns, of which 13 are to the SE: the drums of a sixteenth, brought down by a hurricane in 1852, sprawl on the ground “

The first photo of the columns was taken in October 1965 and the second in June 2009
The capital of the fallen column was accessible in 1965 while in 2009 it was fenced off

A path, on the outside of the platform on which the Temple of Olympian Zeus sits, is  lined by an ancient wall and leads down to some ruins which can be seen from the temple above.

In 2010 I went exploring this area more to get a photo of a different view of the columns than anything else. In my notes I remark on how annoying the cypress tree is in the middle of the photo

[Hilary]

THE THESEION, THE TEMPLE OF HEPHAISTOS

The first dark dull photos are from October 1995 and April 1999, it isn't all sun and blue skies in Greece.
However, the last photos were taken under the bright sun of June 2009.

When The American School of Classical Studies in Greece finished excavating the Athenian Agora they replanted the area with trees and shrubs which were thought to have been growing there in antiquity.
Olive trees, Mulberry trees, Myrtle and others

Those interested in reading THE GARDEN IN ANTIQUITY by Yvonne Linardos will find the article here
 http://www.mediterraneangardensociety.org/journal1.pdf

The first issue of THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN

[Hilary]

SOUNION, THE TEMPLE OF POSEIDON

Three photos taken at Sounion one cold wet windy afternoon in 1966 and three more take on a sunny day in April 1969

I don't have any photos of plants near the ruins at Sounion but my father took the one showing the tops of the columns and Hottentot Fig, Carpobrotus edulis. At the time Hottentot Fig was planted in many public spaces. I imagine it has been expelled from Sounion by now

The best time to visit Sounion is to see the sunset on a clear sunny day, which I never did.

 Byron, who as you all know, scratched his name in the marble   and wrote a short piece about Sounion
 Place me on Sunium's marbled steep,
Where nothing, save the waves and I,
May hear our mutual murmurs sweep...

The Greek poet George Seferis 1900-1971 also wrote a poem about Sounion Επί ασπαλάθων
Ήταν ωραίο το Σούνιο τη μέρα εκείνη του Ευαγγελισμού
πάλι με την άνοιξη.
Λιγοστά πράσινα φύλλα γύρω στις σκουριασμένες πέτρες
το κόκκινο χώμα κι ασπάλαθοι
δείχνοντας έτοιμα τα μεγάλα τους βελονιά   
και τους κίτρινο τους ανθούς.
Απόμακρα οι αρχαίες κολόνες,  χορδές μιας άρπας που αντηχούν
ακόμη…


I am afraid I couldn’t find a translation in English of this poem which is about Sounion, Spiny broom, Calicotome villosa, Ασπάλαθος and the columns

Sounion is mentioned in CYPRUS BRANCH VISIT TO ATHENS MARCH 2019 by John Joynes
THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN number 98, October 2019

Calicotome villosa is mentioned in
GETTING LOST WITH A FOUND PUPPY: PART 3
by Isabel Sanders
THE MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN number 87, January 2017

And last but not least a photo of, which I hope is, Calicotome villosa

 


   
   

[Hilary]

DELPHI

Two photos from October 1965 and two from April 1969.

You can see that there are plenty of spring flowers in the last two photos.

 We have been back to Delphi at other times but the snaps are all of people posing in front of the columns

[Hilary]

THE CORINTH CANAL

 A photo of the road bridge over the canal when there were only two bridges, now I think there are six or seven.
 The photo was taken in October 1965

The second photo shows the Saronic gulf end of the canal at some later date

The third photo shows the old ferry at the Corinthian gulf end of the canal.

Now there are sinking bridges at both ends of the canal.
The last two photos are of the sinking bridges in action. We are always pleased when our visitors see the bridges sink then rise again, especially when a photogenic yacht or huge ship passes by.

Nothing much to see in the way of vegetation just the ubiquitous pine trees and eucalyptus trees

[Hilary]

I forgot to mention that the Corinth Canal was finished on 25th July 1893

[Charithea]

Thank you Hilary for all those old photos of Greek ancient sights. They bring back many memories. I was going to say that now it would be impossible to walk around alone or take a photo without being in somebody's one but you know what I mean. We were in Sounio last Spring and we're lucky to have our own archaeologist and also an amateur archaeologist talk about the place. Most interesting . We managed to see the sunset too. I will attemp to 'translate' Seferis's poem for you. By the way  I studied maths not Greek literature.
 Sounio was wonderful on Lady Day(25th March)
Being again spring. A little green foliage
Around the rusted stones
The red soil and the thorny brooms
Readily showing its large spines
And it's yellow flowers
A bit further back
The ancient columns
Cords of harps which echoed still.