The Oldest Photograph of the Acropolis of Athens

The oldest photograph of the Acropolis, taken by Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey. Credit: Public Domain

The Acropolis of Athens is astir apt 1 of the astir photographed sites connected the full planet.

However, 1 azygous representation has a peculiar worth for the world, arsenic it is the oldest photograph of the Acropolis ever to person been taken.

The Parthenon and the different buildings connected the Athenian elevation besides known arsenic “the ineffable rock” are masterpieces of classical architecture and monuments to quality history. Completed successful the 5th Century BC, they are inactive influential successful blending harmonic architecture with their earthy surroundings.

The Oldest Photograph of the Acropolis

In the distant twelvemonth of 1842, French lensman and draughtsman Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey took the first-ever photograph of the ”Holy Rock.”

To beryllium much precise, this photograph is simply a daguerreotype, and is really 1 of the earliest surviving photographs of Greece.

Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey took the representation from the Hill of the Nymphs, besides known contiguous arsenic the Hill of the National Observatory.

It depicts portion of the fortification of the Rock, the Parthenon, and immoderate of the different past buildings of the Acropolis.

What is simply a daguerreotype?

The daguerreotype was the archetypal publically disposable photographic process, wide utilized during the 1840s and 1850s.

It was invented by Frenchman Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre and introduced worldwide successful 1839.

To make the photograph, a daguerreotypist would person to polish a silver-plated copper expanse to a mirror. He would past person to dainty it with fumes that made its aboveground delicate to light, and exposure it to a camera.

The creator would past person to marque the resulting representation disposable by treating it with mercury vapor. To implicit the analyzable procedure, helium would region the liquid chemic treatment, rinse and adust the expanse and past seal the effect down a glass.

This was astir what Girault de Prangey did successful Athens successful 1842.

The Newly-Established Greek State

The twelvemonth 1842 was lone 12 years aft the archetypal modern Greek state’s authoritative establishment, and lone 9 years aft the past Ottoman worker near Athens forever.

Athens had go the superior of the Kingdom of Greece successful 1834, lone 8 years earlier the archetypal representation of the Acropolis was taken.

At the time, the metropolis was a tiny town, astir ruined owed to the agelong Greek War of Independence that yet led to Greece’s liberation.

It is worthy mentioning that this was the play erstwhile Georg Maurer, the Regent of the caller Greek state, said that “Athens, which earlier the Liberation War had astir 3,000 houses, present doesn’t adjacent person 300. The remainder person been turned into an amorphous heap of stones.”

The 1840s and 1850s were the decades erstwhile the metropolis of Athens began to instrumentality its modern shape, with its emblematic buildings built astatine that time, including today’s Parliament House.