Lykaion

This short walk starts from the ancient stadium that was used for the athletic festival of the Lykaia, high up on the mountain slopes, and takes you up to the summit of Mount Lykaion, the best excavated summit site in Greece.

We will have a look at the archaeology of Mount Lykaion and the wider region in other posts, but this post gives you a glimpse of the mountain’s amazing mythological and literary heritage.

Werewolves and shadows

Mount Lykaion is a mountain of stories. From origin myths to the outrageously bloodthirsty, the mountain—which rises nearly 1500 metres above the plains of southern Arkadia—is awash with varied traditions, which were perhaps as murky to the ancient writers describing them as they are to us today.

It’s a remarkable heritage for a mountain that can at first appear rather banal: its rolling upper slopes are dotted with bushes and low trees as opposed to the vast scree slopes and towering cliffs of some other Peloponnesian mountains, and a car will take you practically all the way to the top. Yet the views from the summit are spectacular, and as soon as you reach the ancient stadium you know you are in a special place.

The mountain is most famous for its mythical namesake, King Lykaon, and his lupine transformation. After founding the city of Lykosoura (approximately 10 kilometres south of Lykaion ’s peak), he went to the mountain where, depending on the author, he either ritually sacrificed a prisoner, a baby, his own son, or some combination of the three, and was promptly turned into a wolf by Zeus for his depravity (Pausanias, Periegesis 8.2.1-6). 

This tale of a proto-werewolf (lykos is the Greek word for wolf, proving a neat aetiological link) demonstrated the punishment for wickedness and lack of piety, along with the Greek horror of human sacrifices (a tradition relegated only to barbarians by classical times, such as in the Euripides’ play Iphigenia at Tauris).

According to Apollodorus, Lykaon and his fifty (yes, fifty) sons ‘exceeded all men in pride and impiety’ (Apollodorus, Library 3.8.1). Ovid presents Lykaon as a man who mocks pious worshippers, plans to murder his guest, and, upon his transformation into a wolf, promptly turns on a flock of sheep ‘taking pleasure in blood’ (Ovid, Metamorphoes 1.235).

Apart from all the gory delights, there’s a line of morality evident behind the endless slaughter: Apollodorus, Ovid, and Pausanias all emphasise Lykaion’s impiety.

Pausanias also writes of a sacred precinct of Zeus on Mt Lykaion:

into which people are not allowed to enter. If anyone ignores the rule and enters, it is absolutely certain that he will live for now more than a year. It was also said that things inside the sanctuary, whether animal or human, did not cast a shadow. And for this reason when a wild animal takes refuge in the sanctuary, the hunter is not willing to rush in after it, but waits outside, and though he sees the animal he cannot see its shadow. (8.38.6)

Arkadia’s antiquity

One reason for these sensationalistic stories may be the fact that Mount Lykaion and the surrounding region of Arkadia were perceived in the Greek imagination as extraordinarily ancient places, far removed from urban civilisation. In that context it’s maybe no surprise that the mountain is associated with supernatural happenings, or odd or uncivilised religious practices.

Pausanias claims that the city of Lykosoura was the oldest city in the world, and that the technology for every other city was modelled upon it (8.38.1).

This supposed age of the Arkadians allowed them even to tell stories about divine and cosmic events differently from other parts of the Greek world:

Some of the Arkadians call it [Mount Lykaion] Olympus, and others Sacred Peak. They say that Zeus was reared on this mountain. There is a place on Mount Lykaion called Kretea, on the left of the grove of Apollo which is called the Parrhasian grove, and the Arkadians claim that the Crete, where the Cretan story says that Zeus was reared, was this place and not the island. (8.38.2)

That claim, which contradicted the standard account, was very widely known: it was mentioned by the Hellenistic Alexandrian poet Callimachus, and by Roman authors like Cicero.

The site today

Today, visitors to Lykaion can view the ruins of the forbidden sanctuary and the sacrificial altar. 

Though the modern town of Ano Karyes claims a winter population of twenty-two people, in ancient times this was no remote backwater: the site offered a well-developed infrastructure for competitors and visitors, including a hippodrome (horse-racing complex), stoa (covered colonnade), stadium (where athletic competitions were held), xenon (lodging for visitors) and bathhouse.

But it wasn’t all cozy: recent excavations have discovered a human skeleton under the altar (although there’s no clear evidence that this is associated with the traditions of human sacrifice reported by Pausanias!) 

If you want to explore further, the Mount Lykaion Excavation and Survey Project runs an exhaustive website that posts the latest updates from the excavations, and also includes a fantastic catalogue of ancient literary sources connected with the mountain.

The route

There are some wonderful signposted paths within the Parrhasian Heritage Park around Mount Lykaion: their website has the details.

But if you just want to go up to have a look at the summit you can drive up to the stadium from the village of Ano Karyes west of Megalopoli.

From there a track winds round the back of the mountain and up to the summit plateau, which was the site of sacrifice in antiquity.

You can see some column bases a little lower down: the remains of the sanctuary of Zeus mentioned by Pausanias.

It’s a beautiful place, especially in late spring and early summer with the whole mountainside carpeted in flowers!

You can take a more direct line up the slope if you want to, but if you follow the track, the walk from the stadium to the summit and back by the same route is about 6.5 km, and 200 metres of ascent.

The start point for the route is here. The downloadable GPX file is below.