Under the Parthenon, the sculptures that once stood on it
The sculptures and finds of the Acropolis hill and its slopes: the Parthenon frieze, metopes and pediments on the top floor, the five original Caryatids, and the painted Archaic statues of young women on the first floor.
On a balcony on the first floor, on the west side.
On the third floor, the Parthenon Gallery.
Yes, except in the Archaic Gallery on the first floor, where photographs and video are banned.
On 1 January, Orthodox Easter Sunday, 1 May and 25 and 26 December. It closes early on 24 and 31 December and on Orthodox Holy Saturday, and opens at noon on Orthodox Good Friday.
No. The museum sells its own ticket, at the desk or online on its own site, and that ticket also covers the excavation under the building.
Sculptures from the hill above, brought indoors: the Parthenon frieze in its own order on a glass top floor facing the temple, and the original Erechtheion maidens whose copies stand on the rock.
Everything in the Acropolis Museum came from one hill and its slopes: the temple sculptures, the painted statues of young women offered to Athena, and the pots and small offerings left in the sanctuaries below. Expect marble more than anything else, some of it still carrying traces of its original paint.
From the slopes to the Parthenon
For the rest of ancient Greece, cross the centre to the National Archaeological Museum.
The building is a climb. You come in from the Dionysiou Areopagitou pedestrian street over glass panels that show the excavation below, and the Gallery of the Slopes rises from the ticket gates as a gentle glass-floored ramp.
The first floor is the Archaic Gallery, one big hall where the korai and kouroi stand loose like a crowd. Photographs and video are banned in it, to protect the paint. The Caryatids stand on a balcony on the same floor, on the west side.
The second floor holds the restaurant. The third floor is the Parthenon Gallery, turned on the building so the frieze faces the same way it did on the temple, about 300 metres away through the glass.
Friday evening is the time to come: the galleries stay open late and the Parthenon is lit across the way. In summer, see the hill before the midday heat and come down here afterwards; the south gate of the Acropolis is a few minutes up the same street.
The excavation under the building shuts at 5pm every day in winter, earlier than the galleries on Fridays and weekends, so on a late visit see it first. Then follow the ramp up and finish at the top floor.
The sculptures the museum is known for, each with its floor, why it matters, and how to see it well.
Five of the six marble maidens who held up the porch of the Erechtheion, brought indoors and replaced on the hill by copies; the sixth was taken to London by Lord Elgin, and her place here is left empty. They stand on a balcony you can walk all the way round. Do it, because their braided hair shows only from behind.
The carved procession that ran round the top of the Parthenon's walls, hung here in its original order round a core the size of the temple's inner room, with the temple itself in the window. The originals are the colour of old marble; the pieces held in London are white plaster casts. Start at the south-west corner, where the procession sets off, and walk it all the way round.
Temporary exhibitions change every few months: see the current exhibitions on theacropolismuseum.gr.
More of ancient Athens
Where everything in the museum came from: the Parthenon, and the Erechtheion with copies of the Caryatids on its porch.
The ancient Greece this museum leaves out: bronzes, the gold of Mycenae and the Antikythera mechanism.
The city's old marketplace and civic heart, at the foot of the Acropolis on the Monastiraki side.
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