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Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3

Splitting

Please consider moving much of this content to an Ancient Athens article since a modern city does exist. --Jiang 15:45, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I think Smack's decision to copy the existing articles Athenian democracy and Delian League into this article was a mistake, which should be reversed. We don't turn stubs into articles by padding them with text from other articles. I agree with Jiang (gasp) that this article should deal with modern Athens only. Adam 16:24, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)

"Its subway system is the Attiko Metro which runs from Piraeus to Kifissiá (Cephisia) of most of that line is outside, The red runs from Dáphni and plans to end at Peristéri (first opened in 1997), and the blue begins in Aigáleo (Aegaleus) and now ends NE near the Penteli area."

This paragraph doesn't make much sense. What does "of most of that line is outside" mean? What are the red and the blue? Please rewrite it in coherent English Adam 06:33, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Runs outside means probably runs overground (it does actually).

Sotiris 6 April 2005

There are many errors in the page, but I don't have time to correct them right now, and there are some that I don't know how to correct, so I'm just taking some quick notes of my thoughts here, so that we correct them later.

The Athens Metro system is called "Athens Metro", not Attiko Metro; the later is the name of one of the companies responsible for it. The information about the metro lines is incorrect, and anyway "Athens Metro" should be another article.

There is no "Athens Polytechnic"; it is called "National Technical University of Athens" (it's a very bad translation of its Greek name, but that's how it is officially named in English - see http://www.ntua.gr/).

PAOK is not a soccer team of Athens; it is of Thessaloniki. PAO was intended, which is more commonly called Panathinaikos (PAO means Panathinaikos Athletikos Omilos, that is, Panathenean Athlete Group). This is, I think, the only team of the Municipality of Athens. Now if we include the other teams, which are from other municipalities of greater Athens, we would have to include Olympiakos, which is of Pireus, and it needs careful phrasing, or Olympiakos fans may be offended if we write that Olympiakos is a soccer team of Athens, because they use to distinguish between Pireus and Athens and they have long-term rivalry with Panathinaikos.

I need to look this up, but I believe the Acropolis was first inhabited in Neolithic times. It was around 4500 BC last time I checked (ongoing archaeological investigation continously pushes that date back).


Athens has a long history and it's not easy to separate it into ancient Athens and modern Athens, as was suggested. There is Mycenean Athens (until the beginning of the dark age, around 1100 BC), Classical Athens (from end of the dark age, around 800 BC, to 529 BC, when the schools were closed), Byzantine Athens, up to 1458, Ottoman Athens, up to around 1830, and modern Athens. Distinct articles about specific periods of history would be nice, but I still think an outline (maybe more brief than the existing one) is necessary here.

Antonios Christofides, 10 Jan 2004

Thanks for that. The stuff about the soccer teams and the metro were included by a user who I think is Greek so I assumed they were correct. Now that I know they are not, I will delete them. They don't add much to the article anyway.

The Polytechnic appears as Polytekhnio on my 2002 map of Athens - that may not be its legal name but it seems to be the name it is still called by.

Adam 13:19, 10 Jan 2004 (UTC)

How about showing the Parthenon and the modern Athens pictures right next to each other in the opening. I know Athens is a modern city, but at the same time, the Parthenon is an internationally-recognized symbol of the city. WhisperToMe 01:54, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I love the Acropolis and the Parthenon, but they are such visual cliches that I am opposed to leading an article on modern Athens with them. They belong in the history section, unless and until someone creates a comprehensive Ancient Athens article. The Omonia photo is not very glamorous, but it gives a good idea of what modern Athens really looks like. Having said that, what I really wanted was a good photo of Syntagma Square, but I coulnd't find one. Adam 02:16, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I think that I can take photographs of Syntagma Square if you like. Drop me a note on my talk page and I will upload photo(s) soon. Which view do you think is better? The parliament? .'. Optim 04:27, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC) .'.

Technically, the article is on both modern Athens and its past. Also, the city gets lots of tourist revenue on ancient Greek monuments, but I do agree that the past perception isn't what Athens is totally about.

I also headed the Paris article with the Eiffel Tower, the Rome article with the Colisseum, and et al. WhisperToMe 03:00, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

What I did is that I didn't make the Parthenon the TOPMOST image, but I have it with a new segment of a caption that explains that the Parthenon is now part of the city's tourism industry. WhisperToMe 03:30, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

OK well I won't argue about it. I do think using the Colosseum for Rome and the Eiffel Tower for Paris shows a lack of imagination. Adam 03:49, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Anybody who wants me to take specific photos of Athens, just write a note on my talk page and if I have the time and the ability I will photograph the area you are interested in with a digital camera. .'. Optim 04:27, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC) .'.

Surely the modern name of Piraeus is Piraiefs or Pireefs, not Pireas. Adam 05:21, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure how it's spelled, but it's not pronounced with an "ef" or "ev" sound. It's pronounced somewhat like "pee-reh-ahs". --Delirium 05:31, Jan 13, 2004 (UTC)
Found the spelling: Πειραιάς. So "Peiraias" (letter-by-letter) or "Pireas" (phonetically), or possibly the mixed "Piraias", seem like reasonable transliterations. --Delirium 05:35, Jan 13, 2004 (UTC)

Further research shows I am wrong. The ancient name was Peiraius, which if rendered as a modern Greek name would be Peiraiefs or phonetically Pireefs (just as Eleusis has become Elefsis). But the name has actually changed to Peiraias, as noted above, although the ancient name still appears on many modern maps. (as can be seen in the map below) Adam 05:38, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

From what I can tell after some further research, Πειραιάς is the name in the commonly-spoken Dimotiki tongue of modern Greek, while Πειραιεύς, the ancient Greek name, was apparently revived for a time as the official name in the Katharevousa tongue that was made official through the 1960s or so as part of the "cleansing" of the Greek language to make it a bit more like ancient Greek. So it was officially, in the modern Greek pronounciation, "Pireefs", but this name was, like Katharevousa in general, never widely used in daily speech, which continued to call it Pireas. And when the government eventually gave up on Katharevousa entirely, its official name reverted to Πειραιάς, which is what everyone already called it anyway. Or so I understand. --Delirium 07:37, Jan 13, 2004 (UTC)

Katalavaino tora, efharisto poli. Adam 08:19, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

As can be seen here:
File:Ac.atticamap.jpg

Re this line: "National Technical University of Athens (Ethniko Metsovio Politechnio)." I hestitate to argue with Greeks about Greek words, but this is not an accurate translation. The word for university is panepistimio/n. Metsovo is a town in northern Greece after which this institution was named, because a group of wealthy 19th century benefactors came from that town. A more correct translation would be something like "National Metsovian Polytechnic." In other words, as I originally wrote, it is called the Polytechnic. I realise the institution calls itself the National Technical University of Athens at its English website (presumably because the Metsovian business will puzzle ignorant foreigners), but its Greek website calls it the EMP, and I think we should call it by its real name. Adam 09:18, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Adam, you asked be about the modern Greek name of Athens; I don't know if you read the answer (I answered in my talk page where the question was asked; I'm new here and I'm not sure I'm doing everything correctly), so I'm repeating it here:

Athinai is the ancient Greek name of the city; Athina is the modern Greek name. Athinai was also the name of the city in Katharevousa, an ugly mix of old and modern Greek that was the official language of Greece until 30 years ago (more on this in Greek language). Today everyone calls it and writes it Athina. The old name is still found in some old signs. It would thus be more accurate if the article, in its beginning, mentioned Athina rather than Athinai as the Greek name. It probably needs some disambiguation though, because non-Greek people may be not be aware of how different old Greek is from modern.

The same things are valid for Peiraias (pronounced Pi-re-a's), as was noted above.

Now: National Technical University of Athens. As you noted, and I had already noted, it's a very bad translation of the Greek name. The Greek name, Ethniko Metsovio Politechneio (EMP), stands for "National Metsovian Politechneio". It's not actually from Metsovo, it has been in Athens since it exists, but was named this way in order to honour some guys from Metsovo who donated large amounts early in its history.

I don't know how to translate "Politechneio"; I wouldn't translate it as "Polytechnic", because I think that this, in English, gives the impression of an advanced college or something, not a university. In Greek, the word "Politechneio" is now used for engineering universities. Thus, EMP is a university - you study engineering there, and it's the only place you can study it in Athens, since the University of Athens does not have a school of engineering. Other universities, such as Thessaloniki's, have schools of engineering, which are named something like "Politechniki scholi". It was probably fear of negative impressions of the word "Politechneio" that caused the bad English translation.

Now I happen to have studied there, to be working there, and to work with a professor who five or so years ago made a proposal towards the governing body of EMP, in which he explained that such fears are unfounded, because the name of Ecole Polytechnique de Grenoble does not seem to affect their prestige, and that the translation is contradictory and misleading. He proposed to change it into a simple transliteration, "Ethniko Metsovio Politechneio", in order to have the same acronym in Greek and in English, and promptly, before the Internet explosion (the name is in the URL) would make the change too difficult. Unfortunately, it appears that they dismissed or ignored the proposal, leaving us with a problem.

Maps, as you noted, are likely to mark the campus as "Politechneio" or similar. In addition, if you walk in Athens and ask someone "where is the Nat. Tec. Un. of Ath?", you are unlikely to get an answer - people don't know the English name. On the other hand, people who happen to be engineers and read papers are likely to know EMP by its English name, so they could be misled by "Politechnic".

I still don't like "Athens Polytechnic". How about "Polytechneio"?

Sorry about the lengthy gossip, I thought you'd be interested :-)

Anthony 13 Jan 2004

I think either "Polytechnic", as a translation, or Polytechneio, as a transliteration, are reasonable. I believe at least the major ones (Athens, Thessaloniki) fulfill somewhat the same roles as American polytechnic universities (like Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute), so calling them a "university" isn't really far off the mark, despite them not being panepistimia. In the last 10 years or so the distinction is becoming mostly one of field (engineers go to the polytechneio and liberal arts people go to the panepistimio), not of level of education, but usage probably still remains mixed. --Delirium 22:02, Jan 13, 2004 (UTC)

Efharisto for the clarification on Athinai / Athina - it's a long time since I studied Greek, and since I tried to learn both Ancient and Modern simultaneously, I tend to mix them up. I did know once that Athinai was a katharevousa form (the "ai" ending was actually a plural in Ancient Greek - "the Athenses," because it was originally a group of villages. Thebes is Thibai for the same reason). I will amend the first para to make the change clear.

On the Polytechnic - the reason I mentioned it in the first place was because of the 1973 massacre, which is still a hot issue for Greeks and is commemorated every year. In this context it is definitely "to Politekhnio" whatever its official name may be. I think if you asked an Athenian "what is that building?" they would say "the Polytechnic." The text needs to reflect that. Adam 00:00, 14 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Adam: I really prefer a picture of the Athens of today than Athens of the past. I don't like the photograph of the Acropolis in the article about Athens. (Except for the reasons already given by Adam, there's a picture of the Acropolis in Acropolis, and another one in Acropolis, Athens).

I believe that the history of Athens should go to a separate article (this exists for London: History of London), and only a very brief paragraph and a link should remain here. This article should focus on modern Athens. The Acropolis is very untypical of modern Athens, and has little effect on the daily life of most Athenians.

But of course it's a highly personal preference. The Acropolis is indeed the symbol of the city, and it's understandable that one might want to put photographs of the symbol in the articles about cities. I personally dislike symbols, especially when they are misleading.

Anthony, 16 Jan 2004 (could someone point me to how to automatically add/paste my signature, if such a facility exists?)

Type four tildes: ~~~~ Optim 17:50, 16 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I have no objection to the creation of a separate History of Athens article, in which we can have all the pictures of the Acropolis we like (I have dozens!). Adam 04:20, 17 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Whatever you do with Athens, a photograph of Acropolis must remain. Optim 18:28, 17 Jan 2004 (UTC) (!)

Acropolis

Well, I think most articles in Wikipedia have the convention to display the most well-known building of the city as the first photo in the page. Example: Paris, London, New York, Toronto, Sydney, Moscow. Currently Athens displays the Omonoia Square as the first photo, and the Parthenon of Acropolis is included later in the page. I personally don't have any strong preference regarding this issue, but I think the Parthenon would be more appropriate to be placed first. It is true that few Athenians care about the Parthenon today, IMO, and the "character" of the city has changed a lot from the past (now it is a fast-pacing city, while in the past it was a more peaceful and quiet place). I have also to say that Omonoia Square is not a very beautiful or safe place in Athens, IMO: It is full of drug-users, dangerous or suspicious persons, and not very far away from places of lower social-economic status (just some metres from Omonoia there are groups of ppl who sell illegally-imported cigarettes etc: Athinas Steet). In the past my college (which is private and follows British educational standards) was based in Omonoia and I disliked the place very much; when the college moved away I was very happy that I was not forced to see this noisy place each morning! :) Other students agreed with me, mostly those who had their homes outside the centre of Athens, like me (I live in the northern suburbs, a very quiet and peaceful place when compared to the downtown). I consider Syntagma Square much better than Omonoia, although it also has many drawbacks. Because this is the English Wikipedia I think we can assume that many readers of the Athens article may be possible tourists. I suppose that the tourists are more interested in Parthenon and Acropolis than in Omonoia. At least, Parthenon can still be considered beautiful. Of course a person who lives in the downtown may prefer to see noisy places and big buildings and may consider them as beautiful... But I think (hope) that there are still people who can recognise the beauty of Parthenon and other ancient buildings. I don't think the modern Athens can compete with the Ancient city. I really don't consider modern athens as a beautiful or well-organised city, and I am very sorry to say that. Most (all) foreign students that I know have the same idea with me. So I think it's better to show what is beautiful in a city, and not places like Omonoia which are considered as noisy etc by many people, especially those who have the chance/fortune to live in the peaceful and quiet suburban areas. Of course the Omonoia photo has its place in the Athens article, but it's not necessary to be at the top! Recently I took about 70 photos of Athens and I will upload the best of them soon (you may like to see the first ones in Bank of Greece and Ioannis Kapodistrias). I can take more photos of Parthenon and Acropolis, too (I will). So if you think the current acropolis photo is not beautiful enough, you will have more from me so that you will be able to choose another. So, for all these reasons, because in the other Wikipedia city articles we place the most famous bulding at the top, because Omonoia is not a very well-suited place to be shown to prospective tourists, and because Acropolis is still (I believe) the most famous feature of athens to tourists etc, I suggest to make the Acropolis the topmost photo of Athens, and place the Omonoia (and/or Syntagma, I will upload some Syntagma photos soon) below :) Hope you agree. With Best Wishes for Peace Profound, .'. Optim 07:02, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC) .'.

I thought we had already had this discussion several times. Wikipedia is not a tourist brochure - it is an encyclopaedia. Omonia is much more representative of modern Athens than the Acropolis is, and that's why I deliberately put it at the head of the article. Why is it our job to give people photos they have seen a zillion times before? People use encyclopaedias to learn things. At this article they will learn what Athens really looks like. Adam 07:11, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

well I didn't mean to make it a tourist brochure... it's mainly about consistency with other city articles. Of course we need to show how Athens looks like in reality, and some of my photos shows this very clearly (I will start a "photos of athens" article soon). Optim 08:55, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Well, it's a little ambiguous, because the article is simply entitled Athens, not precisely modern Athens. Thus it of course should cover the entire history of Athens, from ancient times up to the present day. I'm not sure which portion should be given priority, as both are fairly important matters to document in an encyclopedia. On the one hand, modern Athens is more temporally relevant, but on the other hand, ancient Athens has generally more influence and importance in the English-speaking world than modern Athens does. --Delirium 08:40, Jan 25, 2004 (UTC)

The only solution to this is to split the article in two, which I will do soon. Adam 08:46, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

That sounds reasonable, though I think some of the ancient stuff should stay in the "modern" article (albeit not at the very top), because it is a fairly important part of modern Athens's cultural identity. --Delirium 08:50, Jan 25, 2004 (UTC)

Splitting this between Athens and Ancient Athens is a bad idea, IMO. A great many links to this page are from ancient topics. This article should be about the whole history of Athens. If and when the history section of this page gets too long, then and only then would a History of Athens article be created. --mav 10:07, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

The view of people working on this article (of which I don't thbk you are one) is that it is too unweildy as one article and ought logically be split. Kindly don't revert other people's work without knowing what is going on. Adam 10:14, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Then create a History of Athens article for the detailed history and add a summary here as is standard practice for ancient cities. Look at all the links to this page that are from ancient topics. Article linking must be based on common usage and common sense. Athens no more belongs to the modern city as it does to its very notable past. Thus have an article that introduces both and have standard daughter articles cover the detail of certain sections (such as the history if needed). --mav 10:19, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)
No response? Fine, I'll do what I proposed myself at Ancient Athens and then move that to History of Athens. Then I'll summarize some of the modern history here and move it over the detailed history article too. --mav

Do as you please, I'm sick of arguing with people today. So long as you solve the problem of people insisting on heading the article with a touristy photo of the goddam Acropolis (see above ad nauseam). Adam 10:42, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I'm aware of that but I think your particular solution is not a good one for other reasons. I in fact agree that the an overview photo of the city is far more important for the main Athens entry. So I like the current photo. --mav
Whatever happens, the Acropolis must stay here, as it does bring in tons of tourist revenue and is recognized as a symbol of the city, even if the modern Greeks dont put significance on it. At the same time, on the History of Athens page, I replaced the color photo of the acropolis with a b/w photo to "show" the history. WhisperToMe 17:27, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Oh, and while we are at it, lets move the "Outline history" to the Ancient Athens article then move that to the "history of Athens article" - Then we can quickly summarize the history "news style" in the main Athens page. WhisperToMe 17:32, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)
One more thing, I know that Greeks today aren't obsessed over the Acropolis and that it had more of a purpose back then. As this is the English speaking Wikipedia, most people seeing this are outside of Greece. I know that it sounds cliche, but the Parthenon is THE symbol of Athens to foriegners, and it is a big source of income to the city. You have to make the topmost image obvious... most people seeing the modern Athens at the top will go "Who cares about this?" - Its fine to have it somewhere.

Another thing, no matter what, the Acropolis MUST stay in this article. WhisperToMe 23:07, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

As WhisperToMe says, the Parthenon of Acropolis must be included in the Athens article. See what the British Committee for the Restitution of the Parthenon Marbles say: "The Parthenon is the most important symbol of Greek cultural heritage and according to the declaration of universal human and cultural rights the Greek State has a duty to preserve its cultural heritage in its totality, both for its citizens and for the international community." no foreigner would recognise Athens by Omonoia, but Acropolis is the standard world-wide symbol of our city. -- Optim 06:10, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

This really is very tiresome. It is not an encyclopaedia's job to help Athens earn "tons of tourist revenue." It is our job to give readers new information. Everyone who can read knows what the Acropolis looks like, why give them yet another picture of it? Few readers know what the real Athens, home to 3 million people, looks like. It is our job to show them. Why is this so hard to grasp? Adam 08:08, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Of course we will show how modern Athens looks like. I will prepare on "images of athens" article which will include photos of Athens, both ancient and modern. But Acropolis has very important emotional and symbolic value and we cannot "kill" the past in the name of encyclopaedisation. :) Optim 09:18, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

How about this: a photograph of the Acropolis taken from a modern city street, showing it in context of modern buildings. I took some pictures like this last time I was there. To me, as a humble visitor, that's my impression of Athens: a modern city, but then all of sudden, out of nowhere, looms something Ancient that reminds you of the glorious eons of time over which the city has been inhabited. Just my two cents. -- Decumanus 08:15, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

good idea. Adam 09:42, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

That is a great idea! WhisperToMe 01:14, 28 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I took some pictures with this attitude (ancient & modern buildings together), but not showing Parthenon; I didn't find a good place to take photographs of Parthenon yersterday, so I took this kind of ancient+modern pictures with another Acropolis temple. After some processing etc I will upload this week. Optim 06:19, 28 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Have a look at Images of Athens and tell me your opinion. If you have photos of Athens which you can publish under GFDL, fell free to add them there. Optim 08:43, 28 Jan 2004 (UTC)


Well guys there are two possible views of Athens. Either as a native or as a tourist. As a tourist you will see the Acropolis. As a native you will see the modern city. None of the two groups will see Omonoia or will think of Omonoia as representative for Athens!! That is because tourists (if they are minimally rational) will never spend much time in Omonoia but visit the monuments instead. Natives will of course go to places like Syntagma square, Kolonaki, Kifissia, Psirri etc. So choose one of the two views, but by no means not claim that a ghetto-like place like Omonoia with 90% junkies and illegal immigrants is real Athens...

History of Athens

I think that the big Parthenon pic should stay. It shows how long the Parthenon has been in the city. As a matter of fact, I think all modern-color pics of stuff still standing should be moved to the Athens page, with all of the b/w and historical photos at the history page. WhisperToMe 06:06, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It doesn't show us any such thing. The Parthenon is 2,500 years old. Why is a 19th century photo any more informative than a 21st century photo? If you have a photo from the 5th century BC, by all means post it. Adam 07:05, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Sorry, it is too big and its quality is too poor. So I made it into a thumbnail. This both looks better and takes up less space. Everybody happy with that? --mav 06:16, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I think one photo of the Parthenon on this page should be sufficient, really. It is a major icon of both ancient and modern Athens (both to visitors and to many who live there), but Athens has enough stuff in it that there isn't really room for more than one picture of any one landmark in this article. Same way we only have one image of the White Tower of Thessaloniki in the Thessaloniki article. --Delirium 07:10, Feb 7, 2004 (UTC)

Err, correction. Apparently we have zero pictures of the White Tower in the Thessaloniki article. That's an oversight, since it really is a major part of the city (it's the most notable landmark in the downtown commercial district). But that article is currently too short to really fit it. --Delirium 07:11, Feb 7, 2004 (UTC)
Delirium, we were talking about the History of Athens article in this thread, but the talk moved to Talk:History of Athens

New Parthenon pic

The relatively intact western face of the Parthenon

I consider this photo that Adam put up to be very beautiful. I think this should head the Athens article until my request to Optim can be filled out. WhisperToMe 16:09, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Reason for moving Omonia down

<Vicious]> Oh <Vicious]> That of that Omonia Square <Vicious]> Yea, Adam Carr REALLY wants Omonia Square first <Head> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Parthenon temple at the Acropolis Athens in 2004.jpg that's a bitmap, not a jpeg! <Hadal> Vicious]: then tell him to get a better picture of it. Something that isn't poorly scanned from a newspaper.

<Vicious]> Also, he objected to having the Parthenon first in the Athens article
<Vicious]> Look at Toronto, Paris, Tokyo, New York, Moscow, Sydney, etc
<Vicious]> The most recognizeable building is first in all of them
<Vicious]> So, should I go ahead and move the Parthenon pic up?
<Hadal> I would say so, at least until he gets an improved Omonia Square image.
<Vicious]> Ok

WhisperToMe 19:27, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

"Athinai" explanation

Anyway I think that the whole article is puzzling. In the infobox, the authors give details only of the Athinaion Municipality, and not the Athens Capital District (Lekanopedion Athinas) with 54 municipalities and communities, all of which consist the capital of Greece, Athina or Athens. But in the pictures there are even places from Marousi, another municipality of the capital district. Anyway, there is no a single governent for the Capital District but the most near governmental entity is Athens Prefecture (Nomarchia Athinon), nor Athinaion Municipality, nor the Attica prefecture.


I think that it should be explained on the header that Athinai is plural for Athina, but it can be done in a more "compact" way.

In Ancient Greek Athens was called Athinai (Αθήναι, plural for Athena),

As for the relevance, it helps us understand the "difference" between "Athina" and "Athinai". I would have asked, "What is Athinai? Is it some weird alternate spelling of Athina?" - Now that I know, I think it should be in there. No, this isn't an article about Greek etymology, but that specific piece of info is needed for people to "get" why Athina and Athinai are different. WhisperToMe 03:50, 28 May 2004 (UTC)


I agree. You should leave the explaination what Athinai means in the top of the article. Else there can be the misconception that these are two different names of the city. In reality it is just a habit greeks had, to give big cities (polis) the name in plural as they were a collection of smaller ones. Athens for example was a city consisting of 10 borroughs (dimoi). Of course nowadays central Athens is viewed as one city and is called accordingly Athina using the singular form...

The ancient name of Athens, in Greek, was Ἀθήναι [pronounced: Athíne, not Athenai or Atheenai (Erasmian pronunciation)]. This name is the plural form of the goddess-protector’s name of the city, Athena [Ancient Greek: Ἀθηνά (Athiná)]. The city’s name changed in Αθήνα (pronounced: Athína) during the 70s, when Καθαρεύουσα [pronounced: Katharévusa (pure language)] was replaced by Δημοτική [pronounced: Dhimotikí (popular language)]. The term Athenian, in Ancient and Modern Greek, is Αθηναί-ος/-α [pronounced: Athinéos (Athenian man) / Athinéa (Athenian woman)]. The plural form of Athenian (Athenians) is Αθηναίοι (pronounced: Athinéi). These prove the relation between Ancient and Modern Greek.

Skyscrapers?

Are there any skyscrapers in Athens? --Dara 13:22, July 15, 2005 (UTC)

No.The area has a pretty high earthquake risk, and the makeup of its terrain makes it hard for large scale construction work( without very high costs).--Jsone 17:38, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

I think the first skyscraper was built around '70s. It's called Athens' Tower (Πύργος των Αθηνών) and it's located at Ampelokipoi. +MATIA ☎ 18:48, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Here's a list from google search results. +MATIA ☎ 18:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, I can't read Greek, but I guess I can Google search for their images in Greek. :) --Dara 11:50, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

You can visit http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/ci/bu/sk/li/?id=100623&bt=2&ht=2&sro=1

there's a list of the 47 current skyscrapers in Athens. Also there are talks about the building of a La Defense like or Canary Wharf like area in the neighborhood of Maroussi close to the Olympic Games site.

As for the quakes keeping Athens out of skyscrapers is a false information, since having that on mind cities like Mexico, Los Angeles, San Francisco or Santiago de Chile would never have had any highrise. In Mexico you have to add a volcano (Popocatepetl)

For skyscrapers and tall buildings in Athens read this: ATHENS SKYSCRAPERS AND HIGHRISES: A CHRONICLE - The DEFINITIVE Tread !!! --Guru7 16:03, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Hello! There was an interesting article on Kathimerini newspaper claiming that no tall buildings are allowed in a very large buffer area around acropolis hill. --Vassilis stath 09:55, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

You are right Vassilis. The acropolis is thought to remain the highest point in Athens so that this landmark doesn't get marginilized by newer "culturally less important" buidlings.

Population has to be 5 million

If the official population numbers are 3.9 million, that leaves around 7 million people in the rest of Greece. Let us say 1 million in Thessaloniki. Now we have 6 million left. Where are they all living? Certainly not on the islands. Thrace is near empty. Macedonia is underpopulated. Epirus is for lovers of solitude. Peloponnese delights with its vast empty landscapes and Thessalia is a kambos. Finally, Larissa, Edessa, Patra, Heraklion, Volos do not number more than one million between them. Things make sense when you attribute to Athens a great, big, fat taliron: 5 million.Politis 18:31, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

The figures here are grosely inaccurate (as we know Athens really HAS to be atleast 5.5 Million people) but census in Greece simply cant be accurate because Athenians move back to thier home villages to be counted inorder to obtain better funding by the government.

In short, they are luckily trying new methods to count the population but Athens is certainly a hell of alot bigger than this. (Giorgos 03:26, 16 July 2006 (UTC))

The urban population of 2.6 millions which is refered is not the population of the agglomeration of Athens which includes the greater area of Piraeus. The population of the urban area is 3.130.841. The 3.7-million thing is the population of Attica (metropolitan area), not Athens Sthenel 18:06, 3 January 2007

Yes the population of athens is definetely closer to 5 million. Especially if you add all the immigrants that have moved in recent years, a lot of them illegal and therefore not registered and aren't counted in any census. Alefbetac 14:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

For god's shake guys, please back-up your claims. The 5 million figure is propagated almost as an urban legend. Do you have any figure for that? Any census? Because it might as well be 6 million. What makes one figure stronger than the other? Because many people say so? Or because the TV said so? I want to see some citation from a statistical office or scientific research. Energon 19:46, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

'City Info?

What's the city's info? I mean like where is the Palace (if one available), and what's the Athenian army like, etc.

Economy section

There should be an economy section for the article that describes what type of buisness takes place in Athens.

I agree. Athens needs this section, including major economic sectors and important companies (Energon 16:55, 18 November 2006 (UTC))

terrible transport system

The phrase "The Athens Mass Transit System is currently one of the most modern and efficient systems in Europe" is totaly unjustified. Anyone who lives in Athens could assure you the contrary: athens transport system is inadequate, if not terrible. There are many improvements within the last 5 years, but it's still far from being "one of the most modern and efficient systems in Europe".


I am afraid I have been going every year of my life to Athens for 20 years and the statement you have just made is totally fabricated. Greece has EASILY one of the most modern transport systems in the world and the Athenians do know it. The trams, trains and buses are totally adequate and it has NEVER at anystage been inadequate since the Olympics. If you knew anything the problem has simply been convincing Athenians to leave their cars at home and trust the underground and trams which now they are begining to use in droves. Not only is the system one of the most efficient and modern in Europe, it is also easily one of the cleanest. If it is hard for you to come to terms with, I am sorry, but Greece does have one of the best transport systems in the world, to say 'terrible' shows you know absolutely nothing. Reaper7 08:36, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Four links i found in 1 minute on google:


http://www.hoteltravel.com/greece/athens/guides/transport.htm

http://www.ivebeenthere.co.uk/places/greece/athens/tips/transport

http://www.tbteurope.com/city.asp?CityID=598

http://www.elke.gr/newsletter/newsletter.asp?nid=217&id=260&lang=1

http://www.cityofathens.gr/portal/site/AthensPortalEN/menuitem.b45c8f7eebda0c8bc6e061462d4a76e3/?vgnextoid=f07b7baa8cc68010VgnVCM100000d2a4673eRCRD

Yes Athens is infact one of the most modern and clean transportation networks in Europe, and thats in no way an overstatment. I totally agree with Reaper

Seems to me that many Athenians confuse the quality of the transportation system, and actualy managing to get to their destination in time and with no hassle.

The subway system is in my opinion spotless, but the buses and trolleys, however well planned, suffer from the severe congestion of the Athenean streets. The transportation system is well planned, but it won't work beacuse the city isn't.

Flashback: In 1821 Athens was a small town of about 16.000 inhabitants. The city evolved through the last 180 years to its current official 3.9 million by expanding to connect more settlements in Attica. As far as I know the state didn't regulate the development in any way (Plans for the city by Kleanthes and Schaubert first drawn in 1832 were revised again and again over the years, then scrapped). Roads were built more or less randomly, as the needs arose.

However it happened, Athens is a city with very dysfunctional street planning, that can't support the millions of cars travelling the city any given day.

There is also a pronounced lack of parking space in central Athens. Or rather, a lack of parking space off the streets, where it doesn't affect traffic. Most streets in Athens are one way and are wide enough for two or three cars, but people park on one or both sides, following the unwritten rule that there must be enough space left for one car to get through. Buses don't fare well there.

In most avenues there are seperate bus lanes, that are supposed to make buses bypass the congestion. Sadly meaningful policing in Greece is lacking, so most often they are full of cars, either trying to go faster, or just parked illegally.

Add to that 60000 taxis (or so I hear), many people who are loathe to stop using way too many cars in favor of buses or the subway but still break any and every driving rule in the book, and the result is chaos however well planned and financed your road transportation is.

Sory for the verbosity, I'm no good at being concise. I'm also no authority on this subject, so this is just a personal evaluation that can be partially or completely wrong. pathanb 05:05, 23 August 2006 (UTC)


Its sad that you had to speak without understanding the system. Firstly you have to understand the first fact, no matter how hard to swallow. Athens public transit system is one of the best in Europe easily. The trains and underground run on time. The trams - on time. the buses on time. Does the traffic affect the trams for example? I have rode them over 200 times - perhaps15 times a car making a left or right has made the tram have to stop - the tram hoots, the car moves -over. The only thing besides this that stops a tram? Traffic lights - they are that efficient. Buses on the whole run extrememly well. You are never stuck on them for long periods as say a London bus in England. They are frequent and stick to schedule. Traffic in Athens is and always has been a problem, however it does not effect the transport system as you say. I think the important thing to come to terms with, like some of the other members is simple. I know it is hard to see a little country like Greece have a better, faster and cleaner transport system than say large cities like Rome or London, but it is just the reality, deal with it. Yes Athens is a nightmare to park centrally in. Yes, the city is lacking parks. But in reality, more people chose the public transit system every day. And soon Athens will have the largest public park in Europe. Sorry if this reply dissappoints your image of Athens as a confused and ineffecient city. But try going there and using the transit system, rather than reading out of date web pages. Reaper7 08:26, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually mate, I was born in Athens, and I've lived most of my life here. As I said, I'm no expert, so that's just an opinion. Still, I like my city despite its faults, not because it is perfect. Anyway, I'm not a pompous American snubbing a small country, filled by his own self-importance (or whatever you imagined). I just tried to share my experience as a pedestrian and constant user of mass transit in the city we are talking about.

Talking about experience, the A5 bus from Larissis Railway Station can fluctuate from 50 mins to 1.5 hour depending on the traffic. Do you suppose that it's on time either way? ;)

I still use buses and trolleys all the time, as do a whole lot of people, despite the fact that they *are* often late, which goes to show that they aren't *that* late.

Yes, the underground runs on time, I never said the contrary. It is also dirt cheap, like all public transportation in Athens. :)

I'm not really sure where the park fit in the conversation, but I presume that you are talking about the convesion of the former Elliniko airport to a park. I really hope this happens, both because I have vested financial interests in the area and because, well... I like parks. Sadly, as property values there have skyrocketed in the last 4 years, there has been much talk lately of selling off most of it for private commercial use, and converting just a smaller part of it to a park, if any. :(

I agree with the saying "Παίνεψε το σπίτι σου γιατί θα πέσει να σε πλακώσει" (Speak well of your house, or it will fall to crush you), and I've done my share of brochure type presentations to non-greeks, but if we do that in Wikipedia, I think we are missing the whole point by a mile. Then again, if you aren't Greek, I really don't get the point you are trying to make.

Are we supposed not to use emotes in wikipedia conversations? I haven't seen any. pathanb 14:28, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi again, i'm the one that made the first post in this section. Well, Reaper7, maybe you have visited athens 20 times or so, but i'm an athenian and i use this "modern and efficient" transport system every single day so i know what i'm talking about. The transport system in Athens is slow (except for the metro, of course)and always extremely packed in rush hours. I agree with you that is clean and cheap, and also that it has improved a lot in the recent years, especially after 2000, when the metro started.

Anyway, the mass transit system section of the article has a few more innacuracies:

1. "The Athens Metro is one of the most impressive underground Mass Transit systems in the world. It currently operates four lines..." It's only three lines, two new and one old See here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athens_Mass_Transit_System or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athens_Metro The proastiakos (subarban) line is a different thing.

2. "(the largest fleet of natural gas run buses in Europe)" citation?

3. "it is even considered normal to flag a taxi even when another customer is already in (although, formally, this is forbidden)" well, it's not forbidden anymore for the last 10-15 years or so.

It is forbidden but everyone does it =/= it is not forbidden --5telios 12:08, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

History of the name of Athens

The article mentions that "In the 19th century, this name was formally re-adopted as the city's name." What was the city called before readoption of the ancient name? --5telios 12:00, 21 July 2006 (UTC) --I Assumed it was refering to the name Athinai which was its ancient name I think (or Athena). Giorgos 17:56, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Land area

Where did you found that the metropolitan area of Athens covers 427 km²? They sound a few. Something like 4,270 km² is the true number maybe?

In a second thought 4,270 sound many. I calculate Athens' area between 2,000 and 3,000.

Indeed where did you find that the agglomeration of Athens covers 427 km²? If you calculate the area of each municipality, it's about 412 km². By the way Attica covers 3,808 km² so how could Athens cover 4,000 or 3,000 km²?
So, where did you find the area for the different municipalities? The only ones I know for a fact are the area of Athens (the CITY!), and the area of Attica from the www.gtp.gr. And could you please sign your posts, is it that hard! El Greco 15:45, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
You can find the area of each municipality in www.ypes.gr Sthenel 17:53, 3 January 2007
I'm assuming you speak Greek, cause this is the only land area information I found, http://www.ypes.gr/periferiakh.htm & http://www.ypes.gr/attiki_fisiog.htm both give me: Attica 3808km2 and Athens 427 km2. Otherwise, I can't find anything else. El Greco 16:22, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Then it's ok with the area of Athens since it's refered to be 427 km2 although I doubt if it's accurate. http://www.ypes.gr/topiki.htm here are the area and the population of each municipality by prefecture. I've added the area of them and it's 412km. But you are wrong about the population of 2.664 millions. It doesn't include Piraeus which belongs in the urban Athens area.Sthenel 17:08, 3 January 2007
How much of the Pireas Prefecture are we going to include? All 541,504 or part of it? The way I figured it, Athens (745514) would be the city pop, the Athens Prefecture (2664776) would be the Urban Pop, and the Attica Periphery (3761810) would be the metro Pop. And for the area which you calculated to be 412 km2, maybe you are missing a city or something? Maybe they are including water in the area calculation? El Greco 01:40, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

According to me: the city (Municipality of Athens) 39 km2 and 745,514 pop, urban area (55 municipalities, 48 of Athens prefecture and 7 of Piraeus prefecture-Piraeus, Rentis, Drapetsona, Perama, Nikea, Korydallos, Keratsini) 412 km2 and 3,130,841 , metro area whole Attica (I don't know if we should include the islands and the part of Peloponnisos). Sthenel 11:58, 4 January 2007

Sounds resonable. For the Metro Pop, I think we should include Egina (13,552), Salamina (30,962 & 7,060 - Ambelakia which for some reason is listed seperate of Salamina), the portion of Attica on the main land (Megara, Loutsa, Elefsina, etc.), which is basically the East (403,918) and West (151,612) Attica Prefectures, Pireas and those 6 cities (466,065) and Athens (2,664,776) for a grand total of 3,737,945. For the Metro Area it should include Athens Prefecture, East and West Attica Prefecture, and the Pireas Prefecture (just including Pireas and the surrounding cities, Salamina island and Egina island). Basically the same cities we included in the Metro Pop. I don't have the areas at the moment, but I will check them so that we can come to a consensus. The overall area will be much less than the whole area of Attica (3808km2). El Greco 20:35, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
I think that Metro Pop and Metro Area should include the same regions. This is something very difficult especially for Greeks who don't use these terms. We only use the city-center and the greater area. Even the urban area is difficult to be determined as it could include many municipalities which are out of Athens and Piraeus prefecture. But the urban area shouldn't be more complicated, including only the regions which officially belong to greater Athens (these 55 municipalities). But in the metro thing, I don't think that we should include any island or any region out of the mainland of Attica because they don't have any relationship with what we mean peripheral area of the capital. Sthenel 21:33, 4 January 2007
That's the one major disappointment I have about the Greeks definition of Metro. In the USA you can easily look up metro pop but, in Greece it's very difficult if not impossible to figure it out. That's why I just put in the numbers from the Hellas_in_Numbers.pdf from statistics.gr into the infobox. I still think we should include Salamina Island in the Metro Pop and Area. It's right there next to Athens. I can understand not including Egina since it's so far south. And for the area of Athens, I too get 412 km² but the only thing that comes to mind is they are maybe including the area of Pireas Harbor to get to 427 km2? So to conclude: City: 745,514 & 38.964 km² Urban no salamina: 3,130,841 & (411.717 + 50.417) 462.134 km2 or (427km2 - 477.417 km2) Metro including Salamina: 3,724,393 & 3,057.734 km2. El Greco 03:17, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
If we include Salamina it's like talking about Attica, not Athens, it's very close to Athens but it's an island and it's not connected to the city in terms of geography (as a peripheral region like Acharnes, Marathon, Lavrio etc which belong to the Metro area), it belongs to the adjacent zone of influence though but we should put whole Attica prefecture in this case.. So, my opinion is to put only the mainland of Attica in the metro area and pop. As for the urban, I don't really know how this 427 came up and I don't trust these calculations even from official statistics. Urban - 3,130,841 (2,664,776 + 466,065) and 411.717 km2 (361.300-Athens Pref + 50.417-Piraeus pref). Metro - whole Attica prefecture 3,808 km2 and 3,761,810 or Attica apart from the islands and regions of Peloponnisos (2929 km2 and 3,686,371 if I haven't overlooked anything). Sthenel 11:24, 5 January 2007
Okay, so we will use the Urban: 3,130,841 and 411.717 km2 and for Metro: 3,761,810 and 3,808 km2 - the whole Attica Prefecture. El Greco 16:35, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
I added them to the article. I think that we should do this with other greek cities too and in the article of Piraeus. Sthenel
Sure, what needs to be done? El Greco 18:30, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

To put an infobox just like that of Athens article including the area and population of greater Piraeus (50,417 km2 and 466,065 respectively). It shouldn't be referred as urban as it belongs to the urban area of Athens. Just greater Piraeus. Sthenel 22:27, 6 January 2007

Use the Piraeus talk page now. El Greco 19:10, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Hills

The article mentions that Lykavittos is the tallest hill in Athens. It is not - Tourkovounia is the tallest hill - hence my edit. --5telios 12:52, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

This article reads a bit like Greek Tourism Authority's pamphlet

Means no offense, I lived in Athens for 4 years and loved the experience. But this entry, in my opinion, does read like what you would find on the tourism pamphlet--sounding like advertisement, or destination promotion or something. May be we can change the tone of the article a bit.

Totally agree, even I was born, raised and lived most of my life in Athens. This article needs serious editing. --   Avg    01:38, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Athenian democracy -- I scanned the article quickly, but the most significant contribution of Athens is the concept of democracy -- and democracy isn't featured prominently, if at all ...

Mayor

Mayor does not change until the first of January, no? --5telios 22:33, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Just removed this link: titania hotel in the heart of Athens!!! http://www.titania.gr

Remember this is an encyclopedia not a travel guide! --DimTsi 15:04, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

This article reads a bit like Greek Tourism Authority's pamphlet

Wild guess here - Greece's main industry is Tourism - Athens is the Capital Greece. Therefore maybe Athens is geared towards tourists and the city in many ways is built for them to a great extent. Just a wild guess. Reaper7 15:26, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

The city per say wasn't built for tourists, but the way it evolved has lead to the tourist city feel somewhat. The Greek Government poured money into fixing the Ancient sites of the city (Acropolis, Temples, Agora) rather than the infrastructure of the city like Mass Transit. Tourism brings in more money than all those infrastructure projects. El Greco 16:57, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, I do agree that it reads like a tourism pamphlet. I read through the article and it presents Athens as a rosy city with no problems except perhaps the burning of Parnitha and air pollution which is supposedly somewhat resolved. Also, according to the CIA factbook, "Tourism provides 15% of GDP" so by no means Greece's main industry is tourism. Issues that come to my mind are: overcrowding, traffic, immigration, garbage collection and processing problems as well as the absence of recycling. The switching demographics of the city center (trend of abandonment by locals to the suburbs and replacement with immigrants). Also as noted elsewhere in the discussion I think the absence or simply bad city planning has played a defining role in shaping the character of this urban sprawl. Alefbetac 14:50, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Too many photos

There are too many photos as compared to the text. This is creating lots of empty (white) spaces and making the page ugly overall.

Suggestions:

  1. Add more text, if it is less.
  2. Move some photographs to Photo Gallery
  3. Reduce thumbnail size
  4. Re-placement of Evzones photographs coming at the top is required. Giving an odd and ugly look to the page, with white space below it. Is it that important for the photograph to come at the top of the page?

Kshitijbansal 15:52, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Athens doesnt look like a very visually appealing city from these photographs...which are all over the place the place making the article look congested and unorganized. I think the pictures that make it in the body of the article should be relevant to whats being talked about in the text nearby, the rest can go into the gallery. Kudos to whoever put the seal of Athens in there but it's in the article again towards the bottom in the 'Municipality' section, i think the second one should be done away with. Check out the San Diego article..it has high resolution pictures that give the article color and isnt excessive. Clown57
I implemented most of those changes prior to reading this talk page. I think the article is coming along nicely as a result. - RoyBoy 800 05:10, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
Again, there are too many pictures! It looks disgusting. I am sorry but can people please get there act together here. --Giorgos 03:23, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
How does that look? El Greco (talk · contribs) 14:30, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
I deleted the photo gallery and removed and rearranged a bunch of photos from the rest of the page. The gallery was beginning to become too much trouble, and all other FA city articles don't have a gallery section at all. So, better to take it out now than later. El Greco (talk · contribs) 01:29, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
Removing photo gallery again. El Greco(talk) 14:04, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Third opinion

In response to the request for a third opinion I looked at the discussion here and at El Greco's talk page. The gallery seems to be a reasonable soulution, but I too have experienced problems with maintaining a good gallery. So frequently these become targets for spam photos etc. Some people think that all galleries should be at commons, but I don't agree, and there is no firm policy or guidline. I am also a fan of lots of images within the text, but that can be overdone too. Perhaps you should experiment with the gallery and remove it if it becomes a problem. Removing it in anticipation of problems may be a bit drastic. Cheers! --Kevin Murray 23:36, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

But see, that's the problem! You remove the gallery and the IP user comes and puts it back and doesn't bother to talk about. There are already photos in the article. Here the thing, I want to try to make this page and FA article, but when you look at all FA City articles, they don't have a photo gallery, so I'm trying to remove the gallery, include relevant photos in relevant sections so that the article is up to status with all other FA city articles. Look at New York City, you could have a gallery that enormous, yet there is no gallery and the relevant photos are incorporated into the article. I'm not against having photos, but as you have seen in the talk page, some users think the article reads like a tourist guide, (i.e. more photos). Personally I feel, the article doesn't need the gallery, if the pictures are incorporated in a nice manner into the article. If you look at the article itself and ignore the gallery, there are plenty photos already in it. El Greco(talk) 00:04, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
It seems that you should be more concerned about what conveys the most information in the best manner, not achieving glory with featured article status. Also it seems that you are taking personal ownership of the article, at least to an extent. As far as discussing whether there should or should not be a gallery, I don't see a significant consensus either way at the talk page, and you are the only one voicing an objection, with one person proposing it in 12-06 and another reverting your removal of it. I do have more respect for choices made by registered users, but there is no official policy on that. It seems that you were bold in removing the gallery, but were reverted. You should try to develop a consensus for removal while you continue to improve the article in other ways. --Kevin Murray 00:23, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
When was the gallery added and by whom? It seems to have been first proposed in 12-06 by Kshitijbansal --Kevin Murray 00:23, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
Either it was me, or it was already there and I merely removed a bunch of photos from the body of the article and stuck them into the gallery to ease the reading and organization of the article. It was probably around that time that User Kshitijbansal first proposed it. Would you say keep the gallery the way it is then, or trim it down? El Greco(talk) 01:11, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
My feeling is that if the gallery represents the recent status quo, then the onus is on those wanting to remove it to demonstrate consensus for the change. If your preference is to improve the galley, maybe a good idea is to establish a "sandbox" page as an extention of this talk page and get a group together to develop a superior gallery there, and then post the finished product at the article. I'd be happy to help however I can. Cheers! --Kevin Murray 04:21, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Three point fifth opinion

I can see the problem, but perhaps you could settle for a compromise (not that I have been part of this discussion, or indeed of adding any images, before). Perhaps a photo gallery is acceptable in itself (many other city articles have one), but we could try to influence its content to make it less touristy and more informative? Some general views of the city, its facilities, beauties, uglinesses, typical features beyond the trite (i.e. the odd neighbourhood kafeneio instead of Caryatids, much as I love them) would be an acceptable solution? Let's represent Athens as it really is and should be seen, warts and all, as Cromwell said. athinaios 00:58, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

kekrops you were right about the circumflex.sorry ,it slipped.but I would have eventually noticed,so please don't get nasty :-)

Thanatos666 20:30, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

"nickname" in infobox

One thing I casually removed from the infobox, and which has now been restored, was the "nickname" entry. I find it silly. The very idea that cities have nicknames strikes me as slightly bizarre; even in the few cases where they genuinely do, it really hardly ever is central enough for inclusion in an infobox; and as for the phrases listed in this case ("cradle of democracy" and "City of Athena"), whatever they are, "nicknames" they are not. A nickname is something you use routinely in lieu of the real name, in casual speech. Now, when did any of you hear for the last time: "Hey Niko, what'cha gonna do this weekend?" - "well, guess we'll just go to the cradle of democracy, for bouzoukia and ouzo". Sounds slightly odd? That's because these expressions are descriptive phrases and/or conventional epithets, but not names, let alone nicknames. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:11, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, what about the City of Lights, the City of Brotherly Love, or the Big Apple? Do you not know which cities those are describing? Granted the Cradle (Birthplace) of Democracy is not as common as the City of Athena, but it's still a nickname. Athens is the City of Athena. Athens got its name from the Goddess Athena. Look at how Athens is pronounced in Greek - Athena. El Greco 22:14, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Read more closely. I didn't deny those phrases exist, and I didn't deny they are conventionally associated with Athens. I doubt that "nickname" fits what they are. "Philly" for "Philadelphia", that's a nickname. "City of Brotherly Love", well, it's an epithet - much more conventionally fixed than either of the two you give for Athens. Can you actually cite a few examples where these phrases for Athens are used, as names? I googled for "City of Athena", and the first few pages didn't show a single example. Lots of pages talking of entirely different places, lots of instances where somebody is just using "city of Athena" as an etymological explanation of what the name "Athens" supposedly means; some few instances where it's used as an epithet, in apposition to the real name. No nickname. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:32, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree, in fact the only nickname I have heard used for Athens is "tsimendoupoli" which means cement-city. And this is by no means well established and used like "the big apple" with regard to NY. There simply isn't a well established nickname for the city. Alefbetac 14:54, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

"trolling"

Domitius in editing wrote

who has been trolling this article? please see the "origin of name" for prior versions and do not dismiss the mainstream transliteration scheme of modern Greek (used also by Britannica) as "Greeklish"

trolling? ok Domitie,if you say so,trolling,...
so for the ,edited-written by neohellenes, part of the english wikipedia, correcting errors and adding concrete data and information to the encyclopaedia is obviously wrong.
dystychos anamenomenon.
I won't bother anymore with you guys.
Simply ανεπίδεκτοι μαθήσεως .

Νεοέλληνες με γειά σας ,τα καινούργια σας τα στέκια ,χάρισμά σας!

Thanatos666 22:03, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

New infobox

What about this new infobox? Only the municipality's and metro area and population are included which means that we mention only the center of Athens and after that whole Attica. Where is the urban area and population of Athens which is the most important part and show the real size of the city? - Sthenel 17:35, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

As nobody cares about this, the "metropolitan population" now in the infobox represents the population of Attica while the "metropolitan area" is the Athens urban area, two different things in the same category, because of this ambiguous section of the box - Sthenel 13:01, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

New Edit

I think that the way I have edited this page, by removing many pictures from this unnecessarily long, ugly picture gallery and placing in the article itself makes it look much better. The way it was previously put was aesthetically poor. This is more or less how the articles of the rest of the major European cities resemble!

Why don't you sign your posts next time? You delete relavant pictures in the article for what? To spam the article with all the pictures from the gallery? If you don't have anything to contribute from text, stop contributing pictures, cause that is the last thing this article needs, is more pictures! El Greco 14:39, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
I say we remove the gallery and also 50% of the pics on page. Greek articles are really bugging me at the moment because they look trashy. Athens is one of the worst Euro city articles on wikipedia. This is mainly because of all the photos...though its other things as well. Like El Greco said, the last thing we need is more pictures.

We need to get it straight and pick a handful of the best pictures that represent Athens and use them. I also don't like the infobox picture of the parthenon...but thats a different story. --Giorgos 13:36, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Which ones do you think need removing? Certain ones, like the Athens Metro and the airport, and the government ones are very useful and relevant to the section at hand, the others with the exception of a few are there for show. El Greco (talk · contribs) 01:54, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Tokyo and Athens

An IP editor added Tokyo and Athens to each other's lists of sister cities. Tokyo's official web site does not list Athens as a sister. If a reliable source establishes that Tokyo (not one of the municipalities within it) has a sister-city relation with Tokyo, the information, together with the reliable source, will be valuable additions to the articles. Fg2 11:14, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Largest city in the balkans and Olympiakos?

If Thens is the largest city in the balkans - so it should be stated. Secondly why is Olympiakos listed as a football club of Athens when it is belonging to the city of Piraeus like Ionikos and Ethnikos which are not listed either. Reaper7 18:31, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Well I kind of concur with the second point, Olympiacos is mentioned both in Athens and Piraeus, a choice has to be made right?--   Avg    20:46, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Guys, the article is about Athens urban area and Piraeus is mentioned throughout it as part of it and this is correct. So Olympiacos and other Piraeus clubs should be included in the list. The fact that they are mentioned in Piraeus article doesn't mean anything. Panionios is mentioned in Athens and Nea Smyrni article. - Sthenel 07:26, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

That's like saying the New York Giants and New York Jets are the New Jersey Giants and New Jersey Jets just because there stadium is located in New Jersey and not New York. El Greco(talk) 17:03, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Central Athens

Omonia, Psirri and Gazi(why is this the second item?), Syntagma, Plaka, Monastiraki and Thissio, Kolonaki are mentioned which is fine although that is a list of the tourist centers of Athens. Where are Kypseli, patissia, victoria, exarcheia, sepolia and ampelokipi? To avoid this reading like a tourist pamphlet these are should be mentioned. Alefbetac 15:09, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the Article , there are no information about the economical significance of Athens for Greece. This is pathetic. Please see the Paris article or Rome article to see a how you can add it.

how did

I got nothing against Athens, but how is it that Sparta owns them and Sparta gets destroyed?

User IP 62.38.216.95

It's getting a bit tiring to see User 62.38.216.95 constantly revert the article to the way he likes it, without giving any indication of why his version should be better, or any chance of discussing his changes, only to have them undone by people like El Greco. Might it be time, 62.38.216.95, that you register to wikipedia and start telling us on this page why these changes might be desirable? athinaios 08:08, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, Athinaios. El Greco(talk) 15:30, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
It's still happening. Can the IP user perhaps enter a discussion on this topic? If no agreement is found, this page is going to go back and forth relentlessly and indefinitely, by the looks of it. Surely, there must be better things to do on wikipedia, and surely, Athens deserves better than this? Once again, how do other editors feel about the amount and distribition of images? athinaios 22:50, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Now the user is: 87.202.13.198 El Greco(talk) 15:07, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Dear 62.38.216.95, it's nice to see that you try at least to give an explanation for your latest revert ("undid unnecessary revision" etc). But if you compare the article before and after your renewed interference, you will see that you have not only brought the images back to the way you like them (I assume that's your main concern?) but also undone several useful changes to the actual text, including corrections of grammar or spelling, slight differences of content, improvements of formatting, and internal links. If you're so concerned about the images, can you not at least change them one by one without spoiling the work of others? athinaios 09:21, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
So you "have practically made this page"? That's very nice, but would be easier to believe if you had a username. And you "will not (...) touch the text as long as" others "leave the pictures alone"? Well, everytime you revert, you do touch the text. Do you actually look at anything but the images? Wikipedia is not a picturebook, it's an encyclopaedia. And not one that you own (nor me). athinaios 15:42, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Posted notice to WP:AN3 El Greco(talk) 20:17, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

User I.P. 88.218.47.34

On top of all the other issues this user has he/she commented as follows in one of his edit summaries, quote:

15:26, 1 November 2007 88.218.47.34 (Talk) (73,666 bytes) (Why so much persistence? Are you working for Time?? Take a look at other cities demographic data, ALL of them come from official government sources and not a reporters article! Lets stick to that.)

Aside from the Time inference, (I replied to it unfortunately on the edit summary, since this type of comment doesn't deserve consideration let alone a reply), I would like to ask anyone more knowledgeable on the topic, (since I would rather spend my time doing something other than comparative evaluation of Wikipedia articles on a subject I am not that excited about), is this claim true? Are we treating the Athens article using different standards? Are all other cities populations quoted from official sources only? Is there some specific problem with the population estimate of Athens unique to the city? Is there some systematic attempt to distort pop. data for some specific reason unique to Athens? Please let me know. Thanks. Dr.K. 21:07, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

The sentence before that even states that the Greeks who live in cities go back to the villages where they originate from and register there! So obviously the census data is not going to reflect the true population of the city, hence the Time article supporting those who people (who have lived in Athens, or Greece, or who are familiar with the place) that the population is higher than the census data. Also hence the sentence after that stating the illegal immigrants living in Athens from a credible source. It not really that outrageous of a claim. The population is almost 4 million to begin with, stating from a highly credible source that the population could actually be 5 million is not wrong. El Greco(talk) 22:02, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
But are other cities with similar problems treated this way? Thanks El Greco. Dr.K. 22:15, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Beijing for example states that there are a large number of illegal workers living in the city but provides no reference and no population figure. Cairo and Algiers both state they having housing problems, state the info, but provide no references. Lagos also states like Athens a lower population than precieved. It uses a UN statement that the population should be much higher, but provides no reference, and also states that the lower census population was looked at like a controversy. El Greco(talk) 23:30, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for all the good work. A final question; why are European cities excluded? I'm sure Paris has a large illegal immigrant population. So does London, maybe even other cities. Maybe we should estimate unofficially their pop. also, with proper citations of course. So European cities have the same variety across the board. Dr.K. 23:42, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Well, those were the cities that came to mind where population is not 100% certain, because of their vast size and difficulty of conducting a census. Now for European cities, Moscow has a census population of 10 million, and an estimated illegal population of several million, no reference and home to 1.5 million Muslims and 100k Chechens, unsourced as well. Paris is somewhat referenced, it doesn't state that the population could be any higher, it just gives the census information. London, Madrid, and Berlin don't mention much other than their census data, but in London's case they do give a few different metro pop numbers. El Greco(talk) 00:49, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Thank you very much El Greco and I really apologise for not helping you more to get these stats but trying to estimate the population of Athens, or of other European cities for that matter, is a subject that never really grew on me. I wouldn't have touched this subject with a ten foot pole, but seeing this edit war over the population figures and one of our best articles being defaced like this I tried to help. I recognise that we operate well within Wikipedia policies providing alternate estimates from reliable sources. I don't think that we should have to rewrite the articles of every European city just because their population figures don't have alternate estimates. Let every article develop at its own pace. Obviously this anon user thinks that we are discriminating against Athens if we include alternate, even well cited sources. He even doesn't do us the favour to provide his own ten (10) alternate and better estimates that he mentioned in his edit summaries. He doesn't even do us the favour to participate in this debate. And we are running all over the place, you much more than I, to try to find some accomodation for an anon user who is also an absentee in a debate he started by edit warring in the edit summaries. This is an intractable problem because logic and Wikipedia policy just seem to have no traction at the moment. I had a similar problem in the talkpage of the Greeks article with an anon who challenged the immigration figures provided in the article. I mediated then and the problem was solved. You provided data that helps demonstrate that Athens is not singled out in the treatment of its demographic analysis. If logic prevails, against all odds, and this case gets resolved you deserve all the credit. Again, thank you very much for all your great effort. I'm sure we'll meet again. Take care. Dr.K. 01:43, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Also: Do other European countries have the same census policy as Greece? Do people leave London, Paris, Madrid to register in their hometowns during census? Dr.K. 23:20, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Additional comment: If illegal immigration is not included or estimated in the pop. numbers of any other city, we have a perception problem. If not, the anonymous editor has no ground whatever. Dr.K. 23:10, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

I think that we should keep the estimation as it was before, stating that some Athenians go back to the place of their origin. - Sthenel 06:31, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I'm not clear as to the before. Could you elaborate? Dr.K. 12:18, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Hi there. The reason I keep reverting that 5 million thing is simple. Athens population, might be more, might be less. But the OFFICIAL population as recorded by the Greek National Statistical service of Greece, or by Eurostat is 3.8 million. Now ALL population statistics for ALL cities and countries from ALL over the world rely on OFFICIAL statistics. Hence the meaning of having an official body to measure such statistics. Otherwise every journalist or me or you would come up with a figure. I really cant understand why we should state a Times article about Greece's fires, which happens to state that Athens 5 million residents as a credible source for population statistics. I could presend another article for instance that states that Athens population is 4.3 million and yet another article from another magazine that states Athens population is 4.5 million. Get the picture? So I propose, generally and not just for that article, to stick to the OFFICIAL data as presented by Governments or other international organizations. Thanx88.218.34.38 19:50, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
Everyone must understand that Travel Guides and Journalist articles cannot offer reliable and credible population statistics. Its just not their job to do that. Only Official Government and other international organizations can do that job.

If we do that for Athens then we have to do it for the rest of the articles in Wikipedia concerning Cities and Countries. And frankly every City i ve read, relies only on OFFICIAL DATA. Now I dont know why we treat exceptionally Athens by adding Travel guide and magazine data.....88.218.34.38 20:05, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

See discussion above. Athens is not singled out. I'll add data from BBC shortly. Dr.K. 20:07, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
The official data is inadequate. Everyone is quoting higher than the official estimate. There is no harm to quote estimates higher than 3.7 mil since this is a very low estimate and nobody believes it. If you feel so inclined please quote your 4 mil sources as well. I know I'll quote mine. Anyway aside from the tourist guides etc. the International railway journal and the BBC are very reliable sources. Dr.K.
The Time article should stay as well, it is just as reliabe and credible as the BBC. El Greco(talk) 20:40, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
Nevermind, I didn't notice it when I skimmed the article, but now I do. El Greco(talk) 20:43, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
It just disappeared in the shuffle. I just restored it. Anyway at least we had a nice discussion with the gentlemen/ladies from the I.P. and that beats discussions over the edit summary field any day. Now maybe I can relax a little by pursuing a better activity like going to my dentist appointment. Dr.K. 20:48, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
El Greco, who gets to decide if the official data are inadequate or not? And with what criteria? How do you know that the 3.8 million figure is very low and nobody believes it? Did you do a poll?

I think you approach the whole subject very simplistic. What I have said is that regardless of whether we agree with the 3,8 million figure or not, that is the OFFICIAL figure and we must stick to that. Now there is harm if we start stating 10 other possible populations from 10 other sources. We confuse the reader and we become less credible. Plus we dont keep a constant policy for Wikipedia. I mean are there any OTHER City articles in Wikipedia that source the BBC or International railway journal (??) as their references for population statistics? If there are, plz do tell me. ALL statistics in Wikipedia regarding population, economy etc are taken from official international organizations and not the BBC or other journals or magazines...88.218.34.38 20:51, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

But the BBC, Time and others are what Wikipedia call reliable sources. They just reflect a sentinment that, the population of Athens is higher than it appears. That's all. The actual statistical figures are there as well. El Greco(talk) 20:56, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
I guess I spoke too soon. I quote from this debate, (just above):
Now for European cities, Moscow has a census population of 10 million, and an estimated illegal population of several million, no reference and home to 1.5 million Muslims and 100k Chechens, unsourced as well. Paris is somewhat referenced, it doesn't state that the population could be any higher, it just gives the census information. London, Madrid, and Berlin don't mention much other than their census data, but in London's case they do give a few different metro pop numbers.
Other cities get similar treatment by guessing. Here we provided cited guesses. There is no difference. Dr.K. 21:06, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
I agree. User:88.218.34.38 is right in so far that the official census numbers should be mentioned and also clearly pointed out as the only official numbers. But, it should also be made clear that there is a large body of opinion, some more informed, some less so, that suggests numbers nearer 5 million for the urban area (and at the geographic growth rate that I observe over the last few years, it's very hard to tell where the city stops). Of course, it must also be stressed in the article, that such estimates are not based on official statistics and may be unreliable. I am an Athenian metoikos, and I don't think I have ever met anyone who believes in the three point something figure. And no, I don't know where the truth of the matter is, but surely, if there is a very commonly held view that the population is much higher than officially recorded, that is worth stating in itself. Look at it it this way: Kilgalligan, County Mayo, Western Ireland, has a population of, say, 120. Fine. If there were to be a common belief, held both by its residents and by outsiders, that its actual population is more than a million more than that, and the existence of such a belief could be supported by references, why should it not be mentioned, irrespective of whether it's true? Wikipedia does not claim to tell the truth, but it aspires to reflect what's commonly considered as truth, and to reflect mostly mainstream opinion. In my experience, Greek government statistics are rarely seen, per se, as more reliable than other sources. athinaios 21:17, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
I agree with all your points. I also agree with the I.P. users that if Athens got special or disadvantaged treatment viz a vis other cities that this inequality should be eliminated, if it existed. But El Greco's research indicates this is not the case. Dr.K. 21:25, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Greek photography

Greek photography, if you check previous discussion on this page, you'll find that the inclusion of large amount of photos has been cause for controversy in the past. Whatever one's opinion on the topic, the edits you just made have the unpleasant effect of breaking up the text of the "Athenian neighbourhoods" section, making it look ugly and disorganised. You should ponder putting your images in the gallery near the end of the article, or alernating them between position on the left and the right. athinaios 18:10, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Omonia

Just a quick question , for all editors who know Athens. I live about 10 minutes from Omonia, and I have a feeling that "vibrant and multicultural" is a bit of a euphemism, not to say misleading. After all, this page is not a tourist brochure. Any thoughts? athinaios 17:48, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

What I know about Omonia is that it's filled with weird people and foreigners hang out there. I mean it's a tourist hotspot (ie. multicultural) and there is always something going on (traffic, people, tourism, etc.). I don't know how else to rewrite it, "Omonia is a busy and tourist filled part of Athens"? El Greco(talk) 21:57, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
El Greco, it's not a tourist hotspot. It's the only of the main squares that all recent urban reorganisations have failed to relieve of massive traffic. In fact, it does not operate so much as an urban square (or, in fact, circle), but rather as a traffic island. It's, admittedly, full of non-nationals, but very few of them are tourists. It's actually a place that most tourists are warned of. It's a place where temporary labourers hang around in case they find someone to employ them; where anything illegal is available, and where shops and kiosks specialised in, well, very special things or publications, tend to accrue. Don't take me wrong, I am not a xenophobe and I, personally, enjoy Omonia (most Greeks and foreigners most certainly don't), but "vibrant and multicultural" makes it sound like something it isn't. Maybe "lively" would do? athinaios 23:05, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
Well tourist hot spot or not, many tourists still go through Omonia on there way to the Archeological Museum or Monastiraki or Syntagma, and it is the intersection of two Metro lines. Personally, I liked Omonia when it was still a circle, instead of this traffic divider. So, "Omonia is a busy and lively part of Athens"? You know what I spent 5 minutes looking at the Omonia section saying to myself, 'Where's this vibrant stuff?', and then I glance over to the image and see it there. Here I thought it was in the Omonia section and not an image caption. I'll remove it, something like that should be in the body of the article, not the caption of an image. El Greco(talk) 01:56, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
I think it's much better now. Sorry if I sounded terribly negative yesterday. I must have been in a bad mood. "Vibrant" is hard to define anyway. I personally find my very own Plateia Exarchion vibrant, but know that many Athenians think it's a dump... But in any case, I think we agree that the pictures here must be treated carefully, to prevent any tourist-brochure impression or tone. athinaios 08:35, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Sister cities

There seems to be another slow-moving edit war going on. Could the users involved perhaps discuss it here? I guess the problem is that only the US cities are shown with a triple designation (city, state, country),whereas all others are simply given a city-country format? If that's the problem, is anyone bothered by it? The Thessaloniki article gives the middle level for most or all cities, leading to referebces like "Cologne, North-Rhine-Westphalia, Germany", which, in my view, is unnecessary and wordy. Is there a need for the US states to be mentioned, as long as there are links to the city articles in question? athinaios (talk) 13:06, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

I would like to see the state mentioned to avoid confusion with other cities named Athens in the US such as Athens (village), New York. Dr.K. (talk) 14:01, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Not to mention:

In the United States:

etc. etc. as found in Athens (disambiguation). Dr.K. (talk) 14:06, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

And yes, the state should be mentioned since if the reader does not choose to activate the link to Athens, US they would never know which Athens it is. This is primary information about the city. It should not be hidden. Dr.K. (talk) 14:12, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Makes sense. So the reverting user should either a) leave it, or b) add region/district/state or whatever to all other cities listed. Take your pick... athinaios (talk) 14:18, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
On second thought: ok, but what about Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia and LA? Presumably, those don't really need a state designation? athinaios (talk) 14:41, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
No they don't because as long as they can be uniquely identified all is well. Take care Athinaios and thanks for raising the issue. Dr.K. (talk) 15:34, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
That's exactly why I keep reverting the IP user. Boston, USA could mean how many different cities in the US. It's not specifing Boston, MA. Hence the placement of the state and that should be for all US cities. Otherwise no clear distiction would be made. And think about it, Is Boston ever refered to as Boston, USA......no.....it's refered to as Boston, MA. Same goes for Philadelphia, PA, etc. Los Angeles redirects to Los Angeles, CA, same for Boston, so you might as well just give the whole address. El Greco(talk) 17:20, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Agreed. I forgot established naming convention for US cities. Dr.K. (talk) 17:33, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Is Boston ever refered to as Boston, USA... yes, outside the USA it is but it's never referred to as Boston, MA, it's not like many people have any idea what MA means.
Los Angeles redirects to Los Angeles, CA. That may have something to do with the fact there's no other US city with that name... So the state name is not needed.
The established naming convention is to NOT have the state added to Philadelphia and Chicago. So I'll remove it. Also note that in most other pages, the [City, USA] format is used where sister cities are listed, for the sake of consistency with other countries.
Please read WP:NC:CITY It's CITY, STATE. This page is establishing which US cities are sister cities, hence the need for the state part. (And for those like the IP user who don't know MA, stands for Massachusetts.) El Greco(talk) 18:58, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Reply to anon: Let's assume you are right about Boston Philadelphia etc. I can understand this. But if you write Athens, USA this is is downright misleading because it presumes that only one Athens exists in the USA. But have a look above. See how many Athens there are? So even if you are right about other cities, for the city name Athens you have to put the State. Dr.K. (talk) 19:03, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Reply to anon: As El Greco said please read WP:NC:CITY as well. Dr.K. (talk) 19:05, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Reply to anon: For your convenience I copied the relevant section from WP:NC:CITY along with highlights for emphasis:

United States The canonical form for cities in the United States is City, State (the "comma convention"). Those cities that need additional disambiguation include their county or parish (for example Elgin, Lancaster County, South Carolina and Elgin, Kershaw County, South Carolina).

A United States city's article, however, should never be titled simply "city, country" (e.g "Detroit, United States"). Dr.K. (talk) 19:12, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Also here: WP:HOCKEY/TPF#Current_squad, example:

Goaltenders

  • Number Player Catches Acquired Place of Birth
  • 35 Canadian Player L 2001 Ottawa, Ontario
  • 36 American Player L 2001 Washington, District of Columbia
  • Defencemen
  • Number Player Shoots Acquired Place of Birth
  • 2 Swedish Player L 1994 Stockholm, Sweden
See, no Washington, USA and no Ottawa, Canada but Stockholm, Sweden is ok. Conclusion: Not all cities are described the same way in Wikipedia because their traditional naming conventions are different. Dr.K. (talk) 19:31, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
As I pointed above already, Chicago and Philadelphia DO NOT follow this convention. Either you use the article name or you don't. Make up your mind. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.196.58.78 (talk) 19:42, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
The states are now listed seperately for Philly and Chicago. But it's CITY, STATE!!! El Greco(talk) 19:47, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
No. If you use the naming conventions, Chicago and Philadelphia have to be listed as [City], [Country]. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.196.121.150 (talk) 20:10, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Please read WP:NC:CITY, because you obviously don't get it. City, country means nothing if there are more than one city in that country with the same name. You're not going to find a second Paris, in France (hence Paris, France), but you will find mutiple Athens' in the United States (hence Athens, Georgia, USA), so you just can't name it city, country. El Greco(talk) 21:01, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
You're not going to find another Los Angeles in the United States either (hence Los Angeles, USA). 86.196.121.150 (talk) 21:36, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
I thought there was some convention I didn't know about involved here. IP user, I think this is partially a misunderstanding. The wp conventions are considered more relevant than article names. athinaios (talk) 22:48, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Could you please cite that convention, then, since article names are not relevant ? 86.196.121.150 (talk) 08:57, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes I can. It has already been quoted at length in this discussion. The key point here is Athens, Georgia. You will find, at the bottom of the guideline in question, that Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and Philadelphia are cities "not requiring the state modifier" (as long as the most famous city of that name is referred to), so feel free to remove the states for those, as far as I'm concerned. While it is true that there are several Bostons in the United States, any reference to simply "Boston", clearly refers to the most important one, namely Boston, MA. athinaios (talk) 10:20, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Athinaios and anon as far as Philadelphia, Boston etc. I think also that the anon has understood the point about Athens Georgia. So I think we have an agreement. Dr.K. (talk) 14:58, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
I've implented it. Let's see if it holds. athinaios (talk) 15:45, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
It'll only go for Philly and Chicago. Boston and LA redirect to their respective city, state. El Greco(talk) 15:50, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
Great. I am glad to see another small problem resolved through reasoned discussion. Thanks to everyone for their input. Dr.K. (talk) 16:08, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
This time I don't understand your last edit, El Greco. The naming convention clearly states that Boston and LA do not need the state listed. The fact that the article names do so is immaterial. Indeed, that's the very reason why someone installed the redirects you refer to. If I say "Goethe never went to Athens", the link will, correctly, redirect you to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Nonetheless, there would be no need to use his full name just because his article does. Thus, I'd suggest not to mention the states for Boston and LA, in the interest of consistency. As stated above, there is no danger that any reader thinks another Boston or LA might be referred to, whereas of Athens, GA, there is. athinaios (talk) 17:40, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
I took back my previous edits, but instead I put the city name over the full wikilink. [[Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles]] So you only see Los Angeles. Instead of having the article redirect, I just wikilinked it straight to the article. I hope that suffices? El Greco(talk) 19:51, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes that does it. Dr.K. (talk) 00:27, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I think that's perfect. See here. athinaios (talk) 00:38, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Archiving talk and some pictures

First, I'll Setup archiving on talk if nobody objects. Second, [1] has some photos that are licensed under creative commons.
Sincerely, Compwhiz II 23:26, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Archiving sounds fine, but please no more photos. The article's got enough, and most of them if I'm not mistaken are PD and avaliable on Wikicommons. El Greco(talk) 23:54, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Whoops! Forgot about this, will get right on it! Compwhiz II(Talk)(Contribs) 04:38, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
 Done Archiving should start in the next couple of days. Compwhiz II(Talk)(Contribs) 14:20, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Population

There is an inconsistency in the article concerning the population of the Athens metropolitan area. In the text it says: "Urban area" of Athens - pop. 3.37 million (2005), area 412 km². In the box, I read: "Metropolitan area" of Athens - pop. 3,761,810, area 411.717 km². Together with the number for the "larger urban zone" (3.89 million), this is very confusing and needs to be checked. Moreover I have the feeling (I may be wrong) that the population of 3.8 million refers to a much larger area, rather 4000 km² than 400 km².134.60.4.181 (talk) 15:35, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Check the intro now, does that make more sense? El Greco(talk) 16:04, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Now is more confusing. In general, the urban area is 412 and the population 3.3 millions, but the infobox refers to the metropolitan area, with 412 (the urban area) and 3.8 millions (Attica population). - Sthenel (talk) 17:19, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Highest temperature.

As the guy above correctly said, the 48.7C is FALSE. I have personally been in touch with the men in charge of the Hellenia Institute of Meteorology, they checked carefully the Tatoi highest that day and it was 48C NOT 48.7C. I got the official confirmation, so the link to this website points to a website with fake data. I corrected it,please don t change and disinform people furtherly.

Maximiliano Herrera -climatologue —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.13.79.130 (talk) 21:03, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Source? El Greco(talk) 21:05, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Can you understand english ?? The source is the OFFICIAL Hellenia Institute of Meteorolrogy and the OFFICIAL document with the observations of July 1977 at Tatoi has been checked by the MAN IN CHARGE. Which language I need to tell you that 48.7C is A LIE ?? Do you want to keep fooling the readers with these bunch of false information ? You can go and check for yourself or talk to the man in charge if you think I am bullshit. This is the address: John Nicolaou HNMS/E1 Tel. +30 210 969-9051 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.220.171.195 (talk) 21:10, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Link or some sort of hard reference? Where are you getting what you're stating. I don't care if you heard it from the Hellenic Institute of Meteorology, I want a source/link something that backs up what you say. A telephone number doesn't prove anything. If what you say is true then it must be posted somewhere on their website, or some source to back it up. El Greco(talk) 21:17, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

You link to websites full of lies and you omit the correct and official information and you don t care about it: that s what you said, just put alink, doesn t matter if it is a sh.. data or correct . It is a real shame

i dont care i will be sorry for the readers, put again the wrong data,it is not my problem...

A link as such proves nothing. And the lack of a link disproves nothing. Link a reputable website, or site a published document. As it is though, I am more inclined to believe personal communication with the head of dept than some random website. Most likely though, neither is a good enough source. Mention both in the article, or mention neither, until some actual reputable source can be found. Druworos (talk) 22:47, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

excellent tap water

What is with the claim that the tap water in Athens is better than mostly everything in the US and Europe? There is no source for this information, and it isn't clear if this "fact" refers to subjective characteristics like taste or something more objective like pollutant levels. Would anyone complain if I deleted this for now? It has remained unreferenced for a while now. Dwr12 (talk) 20:43, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Go ahead. Besides, people from the Greek countryside seem to think Athenian tap water is shit compared to theirs and full of chlorine. So I'll go out on a limb here and say it's prolly not all that good after all :P Druworos (talk) 22:51, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

polikatikies

Athens is dominated by concrete modernist appartment blocks - all virtually identicle - called polikatikies (plural for polykatikia, aka multi-appartment building in Greek.) They are everywhere and are the undenyable image of the city and should be atleast mentioned (the Greek word)as that is what most of Athens consists of. Besides this it is also obvious that more then 4 million people live there.

Agree Reaper7 (talk) 19:34, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Cradle of Western Civilization???

Just because the BBC said so? Western Civ did not come into existence until about 400 AD, and had no direct connection to Athens whatsoever, which is far, far to the East. Athens is a member of the Greco-Roman Civilization, not Western Civilization, and though much may have been exchanged, these are two distinct cultures. Can we clear this up in this article? Jcchat66 (talk) 16:55, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Sure, let's clear it up... [2][3][4][5]--   Avg    23:04, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
What!?!?!?!?!?!? Since when did the Greeks stop being included in Western Civilization? El Greco(talk) 01:01, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Considering that were it not for the Greeks defeating Xerxes, there would be no western civilisation to speak of, where is the problem? Dr.K. (talk) 01:58, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
There are no words for how stupid I believe this member who has attempted to detach the founders of Western Civilisation with anything to do with Western Civilisation. Reaper7 (talk) 19:43, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Let's not get personal. He wanted an answer, he got his answer. No reason to get bitter.--   Avg    20:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Lets not throw accusations now of personal insults. There is a time and a place for political correctness, this is not it. If anything, political correctness defending such a member is dangerous here I am afraid. This is the most ridiculous statement i have heard on Wiki in a long time, I am allowed my opinion, I think it is a stupid statement. Lets not defend it in anyway, even if one's heart must be political correct to defend him. Reaper7 (talk) 20:31, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I am sorry but I agree with Reaper7 here, this is one of the most stupid comments I have ever heard. AVG, do not attempt to bring political correct nagging into this section, the guy is off his head clearly and Reaper7 and the others are justified saying it.
(The above comment "agreeing with Reaper7" was written by Reaper7 himself [6])

The whole concept of "Western civilisation" is pretty empty and completely anachronistic. Yes, Greeks at some times conceptualised their own culture in a West-East opposition, contrasting themselves and their neighbours in Asia. Later, various European cultures saw themselves in opposition to other cultures to the East of themselves. The one opposition has very little to do with the others. Let's replace he term with "European civilisation", then it makes a bit more sense. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:26, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid now it means even less. It's almost a self reference. The logic goes like this: The Athenians were in Europe, therefore their civilisation was a European civilisation. They were the first to develop such a civilisation, ergo cradle of European civilisation. It simply means that the Athenians were the first to develop some type of European civilisation. It does not mean that they influenced any other European civilisations. At least cradle of Western civilisation includes the civilisations of Europe, North and South America i.e. the Western Hemisphere and by implication it denotes that the influence of the Athenian civilisation transcends time and place, because obviously, when the Athenian civilisation was developed there was no USA or other Western countries around. Dr.K. (talk) 03:01, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

What a stunning display of historical research from everyone above. Soooo, Athens has been divorced from being a member of its OWN civilization so it could be arbitrarly joined to Western Civilization? Nice. You've just managed to completely insult two entirely different cultures! The Greeks defeating Xerxes did what exactly? Allowed the Roman Empire to oppress and enslave countless millions instead of the Persians? Either way, the cultures that make up Western Civilization, the Irish, Scottish, English, French, would have been invaded, torn apart, enslaved, and forced into the mines or on to the fields to work until they dropped. Does it matter who the slave-masters are called, Persians, Roman, or Greek? The Greeks may have kept Persia out, but they let the Macedonians in, who went on to create a world with more slaves than ever in the history of mankind. Thank's Alexander for replacing one tyrant with another tyrant ... tyrant being a GREEK word, after all.

There seems to be some confusion as to what, exactly, a civilization is. Until you all answer that, you have no business using, or abusing the word. Get out of your Ivory Towers and do some research. If my question or comment is stupid, then you should back up your claim. Jcchat66 (talk) 18:31, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

I think you are concentrating too much on the negatives. Slavery, unfortunately was part of all these civilisations. Why, it is even part of our own. The US civil war attests to slavery in more recent times. There is slavery in the 21st century as well. However, name calling aside, you have to acknowledge that the Athenian civilisation produced ideas and concepts about architecture, philosophy, theatre, democracy, medicine etc. etc. all of which have been copied heavily by all our western friends, ergo the word cradle. As far as Xerxes you may consider it neither good nor bad that he did not prevail but you cannot deny the fact that the face of Western civilisation would simply be completely different had he prevailed. However our current version of Western civilisation has one cradle and this cradle is Athens. In another universe it might have been Tehran. Dr.K. (talk) 19:13, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
You don't give the Greeks enough credit, and have forgotten the Ionian Greeks sided with Persia against Athens, and helped undermine it along with the Hebrews. The Persian Empire was in decline, and a victory would not have prolonged it, but a defeat certainly hastened it. But it is unlikely history would have been any different either way. As for slavery, not so. The absolute apex of slavery was begun immediately after Alexander's conquests, and continued into Roman times, until the monotheistic revolutions reduced it to a fraction of what it use to be. The slavery practised in Western Civilization was overwhelming nonexistent compared to its Orthodox and Islamic neighbors. That is no an excuse for any Western nation to have had slaves at all, shame on them for allowing it to begin with, but compared to Seleucid, Egypt, and Rome that enslaved potentially a billion slaves over the course of five centuries?
The whole point is being overlooked, however. A definition of Western Civ does not include Athens, period. I see that there are many websites that call it the Cradle of Western Civ, but those sites don't appear to have anything to back it up either. Extensive research into the cultural identities of all the civilizations in the world does NOT yield a connection. Those virtues the Greeks are attested to, the Greeks admittedly got from others. The alphabet and constitutional law from Phoenicia (after all, constitutions were not possible until the alphabet and the common man being able to read it), and beer from Babylon and Egypt. Even a Greek historian (I forgot which one) admits that all the gods they worshipped were from Egypt! So by saying Athens is the Cradle of Western Civilization, when as a culture Western Civ is more like Phoenicia, blantantly offends several entirely worthy cultures for being the cradle of anything. Why not Babylos? Where we get our word for book? Why not Carthage? They had running water and apartment complexes long before Rome, and certainly Athens. As for democracy, that was practised LONG before every civilization amongst most nomadic and semi-pastorial peoples the Greeks called barbarians. That too might have belonged to the Phoenicians, but we will never know, because the Greeks and Romans both burned everything Phoenician to the ground, Carthage by Rome and Tyre by Alexander, and Troy (which had a monopoly on tin as the Phoenicians had, so they were probably a Phoenician people) was destroyed by the Achaeans. And who knows what else was lost. As a culture, they were more aristocractic than democratic, for never did they dare allow slaves, women, or the common person to participate. Democracy is worthless wihtout a classless society, where ALL, not a few, are equal under the law. Western people did NOT learn this from Athens, nor even democracy, as most of what we know about Athens had been lost until this last century. Even then, American colonists learned many of their ideas of government from the Indians, but once again another semi-nomadic, semi-pastorial people not getting credit for their virtues. I am not saying Athens played its part, I am only saying that history points to many other sources for which they are given credit for. Jcchat66 (talk) 20:31, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
Noone claims that the Athenians created the first apartments or that they created the first plumbing. Or that thay created the first alphabet or the first gods or that they even practiced Democracy for the first time. But they were the ones to define it. They gave it its name: Democracy. That they did not include everyone in this democracy is anachronistic criticism. Criticising the Athenians for not including everyone in a classless system when women were not allowed to vote in the US and other countries until the 20th century is not worthy of discussion. Plato, Socrates, Thucydides, Hippocrates, Feidias, Pericles are just a few of the Athenian luminaries who shaped Western thought. Egyptians, Phoenicians, Babylonians etc. all played their part and maybe even influenced the Athenian civilisation. But it was the Athenians and their brilliant institutions and philosophers and the way they applied their ideas in the life of their city who captured the imagination of the West. Their architecture is universally reflected in the West. Their philosophers, culture and concepts and even their terminology still guide and illuminate Western thought and is still studied in universities everywhere. That's why they are universally considered the cradle of Western civilisation. Dr.K. (talk) 22:23, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
For the record, I was not comparing Athens with modern US history, but with ancient and modern societies around the world, generally regarded as "barbaric" precisely because of bais towards the Greco-Roman viewpoint. However, I do not deny any of the above outstanding achievements of the Greeks you mention, or the longstanding influence of their archetecture. But to the use the word "cradle" implies strongly that they are the beginning of something, the progenitors of a culture, a way of life, a civilization. By using cradle, you exclude others that have made contributions AND benifitted, and give the reader a biased point of view. When I teach history, I cannot use such words as "Renaissance Italy was the Cradle of Science and Reason," or "Hamburg is the Cradle of the Hamburger." or "Egypt is the Cradle of Beer." Then I have to justify how they were the first to do this or that or the other, and without any evidence. And what about Orthodox or Islamic Civilization? Did they also not benefit greatly from Athens? Is Athens the cradle of their civilizations as well? After all, Athens currently resides within the cultural boundries of Orthodox Civilization. Did not Byzantium and Russia also enjoy Athenian virtues, perhaps even more so? I do not wish to belittle Athens or the Greeks, but you do a disservice using words like cradle, which means origin or beginning. Clearly, Athens is not the origin of Western Civilization. Jcchat66 (talk) 16:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
I did not invent the expression "cradle of Western civilisation" neither did I write the contested segment in the article. Therefore I personally cannot do a "disservice" for something that clearly is not my expression. This "disservice" has been done by all the websites, historians, people, universities etc. that clearly consider Athens to be the cradle of Western civilisation. They have promoted this point for centuries. I simply agree with them. Now you can disagree with me and with them. But my personal opinion is that what you are stating is a minority opinion and for Wikipedia purposes it might even fall under the domain of WP:OR. You are very entitled to it but clearly Western scholars do recognise Athens as the cradle and I choose to agree with them. Dr.K. (talk) 17:15, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
Minority opinion where? Who has promoted this point for centuries? I AM a Western scholar, studying and teaching history for two decades, and and Classical (Greco-Roman) and Western civilizations are regarded as very different, completely seperate topics. When one speaks of Western history, Athens (or any Greek city) is simply not included. Whether it is the opinion of the majority or not, no academic study that I've heard supports it as anything more than an influencial footnote, NOT the catalyst of Western Civilization, which is called Western for being in Western Europe, not being West of Asia. Sorry for the confusion, but I think the problem lies with use of words more than anything else at this point. Bottom line, "Western" is being used two different ways here, not just one way. That needs to be straightened out. Jcchat66 (talk) 16:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
The Greeks may have kept Persia out, but they let the Macedonians in Jcchat66- So you believe the Macedonians were not a Greek people? Reaper7 (talk) 19:21, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Jcchat as interesting as your comment might be, I'd suggest you have a look at WP:NOR. A simple search around the web shows that the phrase in question is largely used to refer to Greece and Athens in particular. Having a look at what you write on your userpage something tells me you have developed some let's say marginal theories before :-) --   Avg    22:00, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
I appreciate your comment, but amongst historians, using something like

"Cradle of Civilization" is considered original research, as most academic research material do not support such a notion of anything Greek or Roman being the cradle of any other civilization. Usually such catch-phrases are picked up casually in everyday language because its sounds sophisticated, but you generally won't find any books or history professors going around saying things like that. Is your experience different? That is my point. And if you've looked at my other posts, then you should have seen mention of "Evolution of Civilization", which is one of several books that define civilizations and their cultural identities. I cannot take credit for any of it. Jcchat66 (talk) 16:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC) ::::As far as I know the Macedonians were Greek. I didn't see this passage but I believe you. It doesn't alter the fact that Athens was the source though. Alexander himself had thorough Greek education. Dr.K. (talk) 19:24, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Strike my comments. Replied to wrong thread. Dr.K. (talk) 19:28, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

These sentiments are nonsense but unfortunately common, and thus easy to "verify". Ancient Greeks really have no more to do "Western civilization" than with "Islamic civilization", just a vanity that westerners have promoted in the past 400 years. Read The First European Revolution, the origins of western civilization lie in the northern France and Rhineland of the 10th and 11th century. Greek civilization, like Roman and Islamic civilizations, is an influence somewhere between the last two in strength, though the concepts themselves are too wooly to ever produce a reasonably constructive debate. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 00:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I will look into your above-mentioned book if you are fair and look into "Evolution of Civilizations." by Carrol Quigley. Which, I may contend, is NOT wooly and DOES establish very reasonably constructive concepts. Jcchat66 (talk) 16:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Britannica's "disservice"

Quote from Britannica: Athens aricle Modern Greek Athínai, Ancient Greek Athenai, historic city and capital of Greece. Many of classical civilization's intellectual and artistic ideas originated there, and the city is generally considered to be the birthplace of Western civilization.

I guess Britannica is also doing a disservice. Dr.K. (talk) 17:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

But by the way it is worded, no. "The word encyclopedia comes from the Classical Greek "ἐγκύκλιος παιδεία" (pronounced "enkyklios paideia"), literally, a "[well-]rounded education," meaning "general knowledge." You will also note that it does NOT state a fact, but makes it clear using the words "... generally consider ..." An encyclopedia is merely a starting point for a well-researched article, and Wikipedia surpassed the Britannica long ago in that regard. The article makes it clear that Athens if the Cradle of its own civilization as well, Classical Civilization, the other name of Greco-Roman Civilization. Perhaps that gets confused with Western Civilization, as the Greeks may have called themselevs Western in contrast to their Eastern enemies? Maybe we should stop using "Western" if it confuses two entirely different cultures? Jcchat66 (talk) 20:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
I agree completely that Britannica does not do any disservice. In fact it verifies the claim that Athens is the cradle of Western civilisation. I was just referring to my answer above (diff) and this is why I put disservice in quotations. I was answering your specific comments: but you do a disservice using words like cradle, which means origin or beginning. Clearly, Athens is not the origin of Western Civilization. I made an invalid claim (I guess Britannica is also doing a disservice) as a means to demonstrate how illogical the "disservice" claim is, by using the reductio ad absurdum method. I don't think there is (or has ever been) any confusion about the status of Athens and since now we have WP:RS citations about the claim this discussion should be over. Dr.K. (talk) 21:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
If this had been used as a citation to begin with then there would not have been discussion. What really irks me is that "Western civilization" is not defined ... Western from the Greek perspective of being West of Persia, or some other mysterious context? Hopefully now the article will be improved? I desist. Jcchat66 (talk) 16:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
I agree that the Britannica citation was needed. As far as the definition of Western civilisation I think the reason nobody bothered to define it is that Athens is in Europe. Europe has historically been the West. The West then expanded to North (and South) America and there you have it. I am sure what Britannica means by West is not the relative location of Athens with respect to its neighbours or other relativistic geography but rather the simple fact that the Western world is generally considered to have originated within the European boudaries. Dr.K. (talk) 18:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
Western Civilization got its name from being in Western Europe, from the legacy of the total collapse of the Roman Empire, which Eastern Europe did not experience, and continued on with Byzantium and Russia. That is a recognized historical definition, so I disagree. It is NOT a substitute for all of Europe. Where have you ever heard of Russia or Byzantium being part of Western culture? So I recognize the confusion, but in the academic world of historical research, this confusion does not exist. When we speak of civilization, we are speaking of cultural identities, history, world views, etc. Not merely architectural achievements or philosphy, for neither is enough to establish a culture. Culture, the long accumilation of experiences unique to a people, establishes architecture and philosophy, not the other way around. We only know of Athens and its ancient philosophers through Christian monks that preserved their work, and they only preserved it because they could use it to promote Christianity. Does that make Aristotle or Plato Christian? No, it does not. Likewise, merely being in Europe does not make Athens Western. It is arrogance to give so much credit to one city for all that other cultures have achieved without any help from Athens. Far better to have simple stated the facts, for no matter how many citations you might find to support "Athens is the Cradle of Western Civilization," it is still an opinion, not a fact. It is not even the cradle of Classical Civilization for which it belonged, for it was never mentioned by Homer. If you look of "Cradle of Civilization" in wikipedia, you get a discussion of the or oigins of ALL civilizations, and no one city is ever given credit. Such a notion is simply ubsurd. Jcchat66 (talk) 02:19, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
I didn't know that being mentioned by Homer, a fictitious person afterall, was a criterion for being considered the cradle of anything. Anyway aside from Homer and the various definitions of "Western civilisation" and or "cradle" thereof, and not to make such a fine point of all this, let's just agree to disagree. Since this point is a widely accepted designation for Athens and it has been properly cited I think that this matter should end here. Wikipedia's criterion is verifiability not truth according to WP:V. This criterion has been satisfied and that should be recognised even by the most extreme of skeptics. Dr.K. (talk) 02:44, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
It might be helpful to have a look at Western world. You probably choose the narrower modern definition.--   Avg    02:46, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks Avg. These definitions are really mercurial stuff. I guess they are like clothes. You pick the one that suits you best. "However the contribution of Athens to all these possible definitions of Western World has been both undeniable and substantial." Dr.K. (talk) 04:17, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
"However the contribution of Athens to all these possible definitions of Western World has been both undeniable and substantial." That has never been denied, as three fully new civilizations emerged from Classical, Western, Eastern, and Islamic (yes, even the Muslims owe much to the Greeks and Romans). The problem is the definition of the term Western Civilization. So far, I've only heard of two, one for Western Europe, the other for all of Europe. Most of you content that the later is the most dominate, as it appears to used in a general sense. It is also well established that Western Europe is culturally separate from Eastern Europe, and in this regard the term is well known. So what would you have us do? Use Western European Civilization to distinguish that people from Classical Civilization? Do you also wish to contend that Athens exceeded all other Greeks in their contributions? No one has denied my scathing remarks on the absurdity of giving so much credit to one city, rather than to the whole of Classical Civilization. By this, you insult so many others that have contributed. What about all the other contenders for being the Cradle of Western Civilization? Mesopotamia, the Minoans, the Egyptians, Ireland, Rome, Greece (instead of just Athens), and even the Hindus! They all use the general definition of "Western Civilization." So why is Athens claims any better than the rest?

Here's and interesting quote, one of many: "The concept of “The West,” Hitchens argued, is one shaped more by philosophy than by geography: Athens, widely considered to be the cradle of Western civilization, is physically closer to Cairo than it is to London, yet it is the latter which has been an heir to the Greeks’ cultural and philosophical achievements." http://www.campusreportonline.net/main/articles.php?id=131

Irish contender: http://earlywesterncivilization.blogspot.com/2006/12/is-west-extension-of-old-roman-empire_08.html

And on and on this can go. Who was the first person to write such a claim, exactly? I know we've met the standards of Wikipedia, but that does not mean it cannot be exceeded. The claims has no merit, period. Jcchat66 (talk) 06:18, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


Media

does anybody know what is the format to put as an audio .ogg file the native term of Places/Subjects in articles? CuteHappyBrute (talk) 00:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Ottoman Past

I think I know the answer, but I really have to ask: Why was the centuries of Ottoman rule, and all that has happened in that period was so diligently avoided in this article? It does not even get a single sentence. Where are their mosques, schools, buildings and heritage and legacy? How can the history section of such an ancient city be so short and dry?--Murat (talk) 00:45, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

User:85.74.146.154

Please discuss your edits before hand. You are reverting to an older version of the page and that is undoing good edits. May I also remind you to read WP:NOT. Wikipedia is not a dispository of images, that is what Wikimedia Commons is for. El Greco(talk) 21:27, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Infobox!

Hi all, I think this entry urgently needs a city infobox to comply with common wikipedia standards for city entries!

As for Skyscrapers, there is the "Athens Tower" and the "Pireaus tower", the former of which was the tallest building in the Balkans at the time of completion (1971). The latter is said to be on hold due to structural stability problems. All in all though, these two buildings hardly constitute skyscrapers worth mention by any global standards. --alx_bio 11:41, 23 August 2005

In any case, despite whatever beautiful sights the city offers at street level or the nice views of the mountains surrounding the city (making up what is known as the "Attika plain"), the lack of a world-class highrise skyline even on location away from the historic center is nowadays notable and does not add to the city's image and future aspirations as a regional metropolital and financial center, in contrast to other neighbouring cities in the region like Istanbul or Belgrade. (UTC)

The lack of skyscrypers is due to post-military dictatorship belief that no building should be taller than the acropolis which stands 150m from the sea level. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.129.151.225 (talk) 11:10, 28 August 2008 (UTC) [7]

Removal of maps and replacement by street pictures

I have already done two reverts with a single purpose account regarding the removal of maps and replacement of these maps with street pictures. This user has started to edit war. As my limit of WP:3RR is approaching I will not do any reverts. This user seems to have a beef with El Greco and in his edit summary he mentions that El Greco is the only user who does not like his pictures. I disagree. The pictures this user is edit-warring about should not replace the maps at the sections concerning the geography of Athens. Geography means maps not street pictures. Dr.K. (talk) 19:58, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

And to further expand Tasos' edit. Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files, so just because they (pictures) exist, doesn't mean they should be included. Furthermore, Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook and as such, including every possible images of the city within the article makes the article act more as a tourist guide and less encyclopedic, which is what Wikipedia aims for. I understand that Athens is a nice a beautiful place, but you can't show the extent of the political and geographical influence of the city if all you include is pictures of Kiffisias Ave., which only a small part of the road that is actually located within the city. El Greco(talk) 21:33, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
You threw the book at this guy. Awesome. Tasos (Dr.K. (talk) 00:36, 27 August 2008 (UTC))

Metro population

Will the IP user who continually is changing the metro population of the city of Athens, please stop. The metro population of Athens IS NOT 3.8 million, which is the exact same population as Attica. Furthermore cities like Lavrio, Rafina, Vravrona, etc. are to far away to be considered part of the Athens conglomeration. The Metro population of Athens is more clearly like 3.2 million. And we are not going by the LUZ. El Greco(talk) 20:36, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Question for connoisseurs

Unknown building

In April, I took this photograph in Athens. It shows a building with a prominent Norwegian flag in front of it, accompanied on the left by flags of Greece, the European Union, Azerbaijan, Luxembourg (I think), and one other country, maybe Portugal. Does someone maybe know what building it is? I do not think it is the Norwegian embassy because of the other flags and the coat of arms on the wall that doesn't look like the Norwegian one at all... Greetings, Belgian man (talk) 19:05, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Mistake on the extreme Athenian temperatures.

I believe there is a mistake regarding the extreme temperature ever recorded in Athens metropolitan area.The highest temperature ever recorded is 48C in Tatoi and Eleusina according to the national weather service and it was recorded in July 1987 and July 1977.There is a link of the national weather service.Most people believe that the record was the temperature we had last week.IT IS A MISTAKE PLEASE CORRECT IT.

(Please sign and date your comments so that phrases like "last week" make sense.IT WAS A MISTAKE IT HAS BEEN CORRECTED.)
However, the citations [8][9] given for the record temperatures do not support the records claimed in the article. All they say is that, at some point between 1955 and 1997, Elefsina hit 48°C and, at some point between 1955 and 1997, Nea Filadelfia hit –5.8°C. They do not state that these are record temperatures; other places may have been hotter or colder over the same time period, these or other places could have been hotter or colder before 1955 or since 1997. The article also contradicts itself by saying that the Technical University campus and Mount Penteli have been colder than the record low temperature. Dricherby (talk) 13:44, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Population figures / infobox

There seems to be a minor war going on here over population figures. The best way out is right here on the talk page: what figures should be used for city, metro and urban population?

What can we agree is the authoritative source, and what happens when figures change over time? For instance, the infobox currently say "Population statistics (as of 2001)". Those are figures from the national census so they're authoritative, but the numbers are also seven years out-of-date, which is not good for an online encyclopedia.

The question then is: what updated figures are acceptable? Those provided by the central government, even if they're estimates? Provided by the regional government? The city government? Other groups that provide the most-recent figure (which could be an estimate)? Which is more important, authority, accuracy or recentness?

Establishing a consensus on this would help to prevent constant changing of infobox figures. I'll also note that the people who change infoboxes often don't take the time to also update the same figures in the article body itself. Franamax (talk) 14:32, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Athens urban area

The urban area of Athens officially consists of the prefectures of Athens and mainland Piraeus (land 412 and population 3,130,841). Since the municipalities of Acharnes, Voula etc belong to the rest of Attica, they are not part of the urban but the metropolitan area. If we don't use this way to make the disaggregation, then every user can add Acharnes, Voula, Paiania, even Elefsina in the urban area. Besides the road maps of Athens include only the municipalities of Athens and Piraeus prefectures. See also the official website of Vrilissia municipality. - Sthenel (talk) 17:40, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

What is the urban area of Athens being defined as by either you or the IP user, because the metro area has been defined and so any urban area must be smaller in both population and area? Some recalculation might be necessary so before any editing occurs on the article page this has to be dealt with here on the talk page. As far as I recall, the 412 km2 included the Athens prefecture and mainland Piraeus prefecture. So would the IP user like to discuss where the 747.8 km2 came from? El Greco(talk) 22:40, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

El Greco, let me make it clear. 412 km2 is the land of the urban area which was calculated in the past and was wrongly put as metro area. The calculation also gives 3,130,841 as urban pop. These features correspond to the clearly urbanized area. Metro pop 3,761,810 corresponds to Attica population which can be considered as metro area (A metropolitan area usually combines an agglomeration (the contiguous built-up area) with peripheral zones not themselves necessarily urban in character, but closely bound to the center by employment or commerce). - Sthenel (talk) 00:29, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Okay so, 412/3.1 million for urban area, and maybe 3,808/3.7 million for metro area? I really don't like that the Metro pop and area are the whole population and area of the periphery of Attica. Plus, how do you justify that Kythira is in the metro area of Athens? El Greco(talk) 00:41, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. I don't like either that metro area includes islands, so we could say that metro Athens is only Attica peninsula (mainland Attica), in this way we will differentiate Athens metro and Attica periphery. I also made a table below which is my proposal:

Area Zones included Population Land
Athens urban area
3,130,841
411.717 km²
Athens Prefecture 2,664,776 361.300 km²
Piraeus urban area 466,065 50.417 km²
Athens metropolitan area
3,686,371
2,928.717 km²
Athens urban area 3,130,841 411.717 km²
East Attica 403,918 1,512.993 km²
West Attica 151,612 1,004.007 km²

- Sthenel (talk) 02:11, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Sounds Good. I'll go ahead and put it in the infobox. El Greco(talk) 18:05, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Athens

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Athens's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "population":

  • From France: INSEE, Government of France. "Bilan démographique 2008". Retrieved 2009-01-13. {{cite web}}: Check |first= value (help) (in French)
  • From Tokyo: "Population of Tokyo". Tokyo Metropolitan Government. Retrieved 2009-1-1. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  • From Pakistan: Feeney and Alam, 2003
  • From Bratislava: "Urban Bratislava". Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic. December 31, 2005. Retrieved April 25, 2007.
  • From Romania: "Romanian Statistical Yearbook" (PDF). Romanian National Institute of Statistics. 2007. Retrieved 2008-01-20.
  • From Scotland: "Scotland's mid year population estimates". General Register Office for Scotland. 2007-04-26. Retrieved 2007-04-26.
  • From Vienna: (page 10) "Vienna in figures: Special Issue for the EU Presidency 2006" (PDF). City of Vienna. {{cite web}}: Check |url= value (help)
  • From Kiev: The most recent Ukrainian census, conducted on December 5, 2001, gave the population of Kiev as 2611.3 thousand (Ukrcensus.gov.ua - Kyiv city URL accessed on August 4, 2007). Estimates based on the amount of bakery products sold in the city (thus including temporary visitors and commuters) suggest a minimum of 3.5 million. "There are up to 1.5 mln of undercounted residents in Kiev", Korrespondent.net, June 15, 2005. (in Russian)

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 10:23, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

None of those links are used in the article. Unless I'm not following what you're asking. El Greco(talk) 18:22, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

History of Athens

I don't understand it. How could someone possibly make an article on one of the longest lasting cities in history, and include a one paragraph historical section of it, with a few references to some famous philosophers? The rest of the article has at least three subheadings under just about every heading- but history has almost nothing? I'm just shocked. 

75.69.54.192 (talk) 23:06, 5 March 2009 (UTC) -- Daniel --

Images

Wikipedia is not an image repository. Therefore the continual inclusion of more photos is not allowed. If you want to add photos add them to the relevant Wikimedia Commons page which is an image repository. El Greco(talk) 21:51, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

This is not a tourist guide either. Add relevant pictures to relevant sections. El Greco(talk) 15:48, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
Again please take note this is not a tourist guide nor an image repository. El Greco(talk) 23:22, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Street Map?

A street map would be a great addition. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.237.252.227 (talk) 12:33, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

street maps not allowed?

i posted an external link to a street-maps/ points of interest site for athens, but it got removed.. i dont understand which rule i violated...

maybe they thought i was spamming because i did the same thing for thessaloniki, patras and heraklion.. any ideas? Fotismerakos (talk) 14:53, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Was this a photo gallery? If it was it was removed because links to photo galleries are not allowed under WP:EL. El Greco(talk) 21:20, 11 September 2009 (UTC)
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