Athens is not just the capital of Greece — it is a symbolic city for Western civilization. From the cradle of democracy and philosophy to modern art centers, Athens keeps alive the tradition of knowledge, creativity, and aesthetics. A stroll through its streets is a journey through time, where antiquity meets contemporary art, and memory meets evolution.
If you want to experience this unique cultural journey, a visit to the city’s museums is more than essential. Below we present the most important museums of Athens, ticket prices, opening hours, and free admission days.
Acropolis Museum
The Acropolis Museum is an archaeological museum focused on the findings from the archaeological site of the Acropolis of Athens. It is the second most important archaeological museum in Greece, after the National Archaeological Museum on Patission Street. The museum was built to house every artifact found on the sacred rock of the Acropolis and its foothills, covering a broad period from the Mycenaean era to Roman and Early Christian Athens. At the same time, it is located on the Makrygianni archaeological site, a remnant of Roman and early Byzantine settlements.
Ticket: €20 (regular), €10 (reduced)
Hours (April 1 – October 31):
Monday: 09:00–17:00
Tuesday–Thursday: 09:00–20:00
Friday: 09:00–22:00
Saturday–Sunday: 09:00–20:00
Free admission: March 6, March 25, May 18, October 28
https://www.theacropolismuseum.gr/
National Archaeological Museum
National Archaeological Museum collections represent all the civilizations that flourished in the Greek area from the prehistoric era until the end of the Roman period.
It is the most important museum in the country.
The museum is located in Athens, on Patission Street, next to the historic complex of the National Technical University of Athens. In front of it, towards Patission Street, there is a paved square. Its grounds, which also include the Epigraphic Museum, are bounded by Patission, Ipeirou, Bouboulinas, and Tositsa streets.
Ticket: €12 (summer), €6 (winter)
Hours: Tuesday: 13:00–20:00 | Other days: 08:00–20:00
Free admission: March 6, April 18, May 18, October 28, last weekend of September, every first Sunday (November – March)
The Acropolis of Athens
The Acropolis of Athens is a rocky hill rising 157 meters above sea level and approximately 70 meters above the level of the city of Athens. Its summit is trapezoidal, 300 meters long and up to 150 meters wide. The hill is inaccessible from all sides except the west, where the fortified entrance is located, adorned with the magnificent Propylaea.
History
It has been established that the hill was inhabited as early as the 3rd millennium BC. It was home to a settlement due to its natural fortification and sole access from the west, while the upper surface was broad enough to be habitable. The slopes offered water springs. Thucydides wrote: “The Acropolis, which now is the city, once was the city itself” (2.15.3). The local ruler’s megaron (great hall) stood where the Erechtheion was later built. Over time, the ruler gained power and peacefully united all of Attica under his control, except Eleusis.
According to tradition, the ruler who unified Attica was Theseus. This event is placed in the latter half of the 2nd millennium BC. The threat of hostile raids led him to fortify the Acropolis with a wall of large stones, later known as the Cyclopean Wall.
The hereditary monarchy was abolished after the failed Dorian invasion (11th century BC). Power passed to the landowning aristocracy, and an aristocratic regime was established. The Acropolis ceased to be an administrative center; governance shifted to the lower city, the asty. The Acropolis was now used primarily for religious ceremonies, although it continued to be referred to as “the city” until the 4th century BC.
In the 8th century BC, a small temple dedicated to the city’s patroness, Athena Polias, was built on the former site of the Mycenaean ruler’s palace. This temple is mentioned by Homer in both the Odyssey and the Iliad (Book 2.546–549). A wooden olive-wood statue of the goddess (a xoanon)—said to have fallen from the sky—was housed there. Nearby stood the tomb of Cecrops, Athena’s sacred olive tree, the Erechtheis sea, and the mark of Poseidon’s trident. Only two stone bases remain from that temple, near the south wall of the Erechtheion, which once supported the wooden columns of its porch.
A Reconstruction of the Acropolis as it looked in Antiquity, 19th century
In the 6th century BC, the sacred structures of the Athenians began to be built atop the hill, including the Hekatompedon, which was later destroyed during the Persian Wars. It was rebuilt as a much larger temple. The Hekatompedon, named for its length of 100 Athenian feet, was likely a Doric peripteral temple dedicated to Athena Pallas, protector of the city in times of war. The earlier temple of Athena Polias honored her as the guardian of fertility and agriculture.
Inscriptions and sculpture fragments from the Archaic period indicate the existence of smaller buildings, called oikemata, used to store money and precious offerings—five such structures have been identified through archaeological research.
During the rule of Peisistratus, the Acropolis housed numerous bronze and marble statues, vases, and other offerings dedicated by citizens to Athena.
After the Persian defeat in 465 BC, during the time of Pericles, the sacred buildings and walls were reconstructed under the supervision of the sculptor Phidias and architects Mnesikles, Kallikrates, and Kallimachos. The Parthenon, Erechtheion, Propylaea, and Temple of Athena Nike were built and richly decorated.
In the Roman era, a few insignificant additions were made. During the Byzantine period, the Parthenon was converted into a Christian church. Under Frankish rule, it became a Catholic cathedral, and during the Ottoman era, a mosque.
The greatest damage occurred during the Ottoman period. The Turks stored gunpowder in the monuments. In 1645, lightning struck the Propylaea, causing an explosion. In 1687, during the Venetian siege led by Morosini, a bomb hit the Parthenon and destroyed much of it.
Further devastation was inflicted by Scottish Lord Elgin, who, before the Greek War of Independence in 1821, removed large sections of the Parthenon’s frieze, metopes, pediments, one Caryatid, and a column from the Erechtheion—transporting them to Britain. He bribed the Turkish authorities and, in return, gifted the Athenians a clock placed in the ancient Agora.
During the 1821 revolution, the Acropolis was alternately besieged by Greeks and Ottomans, suffering additional damage. In 1834, systematic archaeological restoration work began.
Tickets: €20 (April–October), €10 (November–March)
Opening hours: 08:00–20:00 (last admission: 19:30)
Free entry: On select days (as with the National Archaeological Museum) and every first Sunday (November–March)
National Gallery – Alexandros Soutsos Museum
The National Gallery was founded based on the will of Alexandros Soutsos (1839–1895), a lawyer, art lover, educated in Athens and Paris, and a founding member of the “Friends of the People” Society. In his will, he bequeathed his movable and immovable property, as well as his collection of artworks and coins, to the Greek state for the creation of a “Museum of Fine Arts.”
A key milestone was the 1897 law enacted by the Minister of Education Athanasios Eftaxias “On the establishment of a Museum of Fine Arts.” The National Gallery was officially founded three years later, in 1900, through Law BΨΛΔ΄ “On the salary of the curator of the Gallery in Athens” (April 10, 1900), and the Royal Decree “On the regulations of the National Gallery” (June 28, 1900).
The first director appointed was the painter Georgios Jakobides, who returned from Germany—where he had been residing—to take up the post. The museum was temporarily housed in three rooms on the first floor of the central building of the Polytechnic School.
The National Gallery’s original collection consisted of 258 artworks, drawn from the collections of the Polytechnic School (which had established a small gallery a few years earlier) and the University of Athens, including donations from Theodoros Vryzakis and Stephanos Xenos. It also included the 107 works from Soutsos’ bequest. Over the years, the collection expanded, primarily through donations and bequests of Western European art, especially from affluent members of the Greek diaspora such as Grigorios Maraslis, Theodoros and Aikaterini Rodokanakis, Markos Dragoumis, and others.
Ticket: €10 (regular), €5 (reduced)
Opening hours: Monday: 10:00–18:00 | Tuesday: Closed | Wednesday: 12:00–20:00 | Thursday–Sunday: 10:00–18:00
Benaki Museum (Main Building)
The Benaki Museum of Greek Culture is housed in one of the most beautiful neoclassical buildings in Athens, located near the National Garden and the Hellenic Parliament. The building was donated by Antonis Benakis and his three sisters—Alexandra, Penelope, and Arghini—for the creation of the museum that would house Benakis’s collections.
Following its most recent renovation (1989–2000), the museum now hosts a unique, timeless exhibition tracing the history of Greek culture from prehistory to the 20th century.
Galleries 33–36 on the third floor, newly renovated and enriched with new exhibits, tell the story of modern Greece—from the years just before the Greek War of Independence to World War II.
Ticket: €9 (permanent exhibitions), €6–8 (temporary exhibitions)
Opening hours: Wed & Fri: 10:00–18:00 | Thu & Sat: 10:00–00:00 | Sun: 10:00–16:00
Free admission: Every Thursday from 18:00, March 6, April 18, May 18, October 28, and the first Sunday of each month (November–March)
