Back to Ancient Messene after many years.  What a difference!  Today (in 2022) it easily competes with Delphi and Olympia as a well kept, well presented and rich archaeological site that deserves to be included in the World Heritage List.  It received the European Union Prize for Cultural Heritage in 2005 & 2011.  

Ancient Messene was an important Hellenistic, Roman and Early Byzantine city.  The site is stretched out in the valley below Mount Ithome, 28 km north of Kalamata in the Peloponnese.  The first organised settlement on Mount Ithome dates back to the 9th century BC - with earlier human presence in the Late Neolithicum and Early Bronze Age.  After a series of wars with Sparta between the 8th and 5th centuries BC the settlement on the mountain was given up by its inhabitants.  In 369 BC General Epameinondas from Thebes founded the city below in the valley as the capital of independent Messenia and built according to the urban planing principles of Hippodamus of Miletus.  It served as an important political, cultural and religious centre well into late antiquity when it was abandoned after being sacked by the Goths in 395 AD. 

The 2nd century AD comprehensive description of the city by ‘the father of European travel writing’ Pausanias has been the guide for archaeologists who have found, identified and partly restored many of the public buildings with financial support from the European Union and private donors.

Ancient Messene is not far from the Corinth-Kalamata motorway and can be reached easily either from new Messini and Kalamata airport (about 30 min drive) or coming from Athens by getting off the motorway at exit 16 (Tsakona).  You reach the site via the village of Mavromati which overlooks Ancient Messene.  From a taverna near the village centre you enjoy a magnificent bird eye’s view of the entire archaeological site.  Across the street is a tourist shop offering local products and books on Messene.  There is no shop at the museum.  

We visited in mid-August (open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., in winter until sunset) and had thought it would be too hot but if you avoid the middle of the day (at the entrance it actually says don’t visit between 1 and 5 p.m.) and bring a hat and water along, it is actually quite pleasant.  It was surprisingly green with water coming from Mount Ithome running through the site.  We started at the museum; the €10 ticket covers also the archaeological site about 500 m down the hill.  The museum is small with two rooms and shows some highlights like life-size statues of Hermes and Artemis.  Recent findings are in stores and await the construction of a larger museum.  

Before entering the archaeological site we visited the Arcadian Gate about 700 m to the West of the museum.  A massive construction which is part of the city’s fortification wall.  The gate, still today, serves as a thoroughfare to neighbouring villages.  Back to the museum and down to the entrance to the site (large parking area).  Behind the ticket office is a small cafeteria and washrooms.  Transport is available for people with walking difficulties.  The walk through the site is mainly downhill and takes you on sandy paths to the main places starting with the reconstructed theatre, the Agora, the centrally located Asklepeion, temples of Zeus and Artemis, public buildings like the meat market, the Ekklesiasterion, the Bouleuterion, Treasury (an underground vault that also served as a prison cell), but also two Roman villas and the public sports facility, among them the well preserved stadium which we looked at with awe 

from higher ground with its 18 rows of seats, colonnades and a beautifully re-erected mausoleum at the end of it.   Close by are other sports facilities like the Palaestra and gymnasium which you reach through the re-erected Propylon, a three lane gate.  Burial sites and a cone-form funerary monument line the road.   From here the walk back up to the entrance is not too difficult. 

Messene is a relatively ‘young’ excavation site with work still going on, led by the distinguished archaeologist Petros Themelis.  At the time of our visits digging took place at the Sanctuary of Isis and Sarapis, exploring the underground vaults of the building. 

We left the site through the Laconian Gate on the East side.  From here a dirt road (you need a 4x4 car) winds up to the top of Mount Ithome with its temple of Zeus and the old (deserted) Voulkanou Monastery.   You can also walk up (about two hours) on a narrow path starting in the village centre.  From the Laconian Gate, past the Byzantine (new) Voulkanou Monastery you reach the motorway in about 30 min.  From the Arcadian Gate you can drive about 7 km to the medieval Monastery of the Transfiguration of the Saviour, also known as Andromonastiro, near the village of Petralona.  It can be visited Mon-Fri 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.   It is located in a lush ravine and is the most impressive monastic complex of the Messenian hinterland and one the most beautiful monuments in the Peloponnese. The monastery had remained abandoned for years and unspoilt from modifications.  

About one hour’s drive away past Kalamata in Kardamyli (Mani) the house of modern day travel writer and war hero Patrick Leigh Fermor is worth a visit.  It stands over a very picturesque bay in midst cypress, oak and pine trees, a tranquil refuge which three month per year also functions as a hotel, perhaps the most beautiful of its kind in Greece.  If you want to visit the Fermor House you need to book on line with the Benaki Museum (access is very limited during summer only on Mondays from 11 to 12, in winter also on Thursdays).