Walking in Athens with the Philhellenes and History
The unveiling of the plaque on Filellinon Street.
In London, these special inscriptions are called blue plaques and remind the locals and the town halls of the streets on which memorable personalities were born, lived, acted or died. The first such inscription was placed in 1866., in recent years there has obviously been an attempt to place many plaques that actually have great women, in order to strike a balance between the two sexes. In Paris, another capital that has long systematized references to the past, with thousands of plaques commemoratives for people, war and political events, the memory also touched the animal kingdom. It was recently announced that an elegant sign will be placed for the others and pigeons that lost their lives while on duty in World War I.
We, as usual, were a little late, but at least the initiative is worth it because it will remind us that Greece won its freedom and thanks to a series of Greeks who fought on our side in the fields of battle, politics, diplomacy. At the initiative of the Hellenic Society of Environment and Culture (ELLET) and the cooperation of the Municipality of Athens – through the Society for Development and Tourism Promotion (EATA) – and with the support of sponsors, the action “Walking with the Greeks” was officially presented on Wednesday . In its context, 62 signs were placed on streets bearing the names of members of the philhellenic movement. Because surely the 200 years since the Revolution have dusted off our knowledge of who Loginos Hayden was, for example, but this does not mean that the tourists who will make our city also know the history.
These 62 plaques display portraits of them, as well as explanatory historical texts – in Greek and English – with information about their personalities, but also about the way in which they contributed to the Struggle for Independence. The texts of the plaques, as well as the application, were written by a group of leading historians, such as Maria Efthimiou, Thanos Veremis, Evanthis Hadjivassiliou and others. Because, of course, a sign is necessarily oligopolistic, there is also a QRcode that refers to a larger volume of information material.
In addition to the official launch, there was another surprise. In the presence of the Mayor of Athens, Costas Bakoyannis, the Vice President of ELLET, Costas Stamatopoulos, the Ambassadors of the United States, Jeffrey Payat; of the Philhellenes, which was placed on the homonymous street in the center of Athens. Hopefully this idea will find other imitators, so that the capital has more references to its past.