Buried Cities, Volume 2: Olympia

In Short

This book serves as a historical reconstruction of the ancient Olympic Games, blending narrative storytelling with archaeological reality. It follows a young boy named Charmides as he travels with his father and brother to the sacred valley of Olympia to witness the athletic competitions of antiquity. Through his eyes, the reader experiences the vibrant, bustling festival, only to see it dismantled by the slow march of history, natural disaster, and eventual rediscovery. It endures as a gentle, evocative introduction to the intersection of human ambition, religious devotion, and the physical endurance of art.

The Story

The narrative opens on the dusty, anticipation-filled road to Olympia. Charmides, a young Athenian, travels with his father, Menon, and his brother, Creon, who has spent ten months in rigorous training to compete in the games. As they approach the sanctuary, the landscape transforms from a rural road into a bustling, international fairground. Tent cities, jugglers, merchants from across the known world, and wandering poets create a sensory tapestry that captures the immense scale of the festival. For Charmides, the trip is a bittersweet journey; he admires the physical perfection of the athletes and the beauty of the marble gods, but he feels the sting of his own limitations, wishing there were crowns for "lame boys" to win.

The heart of the story rests on Creon’s participation in the pentathlon. The atmosphere at the stadion is electric, with thousands of spectators packed onto stone benches and hillsides. As Creon competes—running, jumping, throwing the discus, and wrestling—his father’s anxiety and the crowd’s fervor illustrate the high stakes of victory. When Creon ultimately wins, the triumph is not just his, but his family’s and his city’s. The victory celebration is crowned by the awarding of olive wreaths and a song of triumph composed by the observant, poetic Charmides.

The narrative then shifts from the intimate human drama to the sweeping, tragic arc of the sanctuary itself. The glory of Olympia does not last. The book traces the slow decline of the site as political tides turn, the games are outlawed by Christian emperors, and the once-gilded statues are looted or melted down. Nature completes the destruction: earthquakes topple temples, the Kladeos river floods the valley with silt, and the site disappears beneath layers of earth and time.

The final movement of the book follows the nineteenth-century excavators who return to the valley. With the patience of detectives, these archaeologists piece together the broken history of the site. They recover shattered pediments and fragmented statues, eventually unearthing the Hermes of Praxiteles from the clay of the temple of Hera. The narrative concludes with a reflection on the site’s current state—a place of ruins where the modern visitor walks the same ground as ancient athletes, finding in the silent stone a lingering connection to the past. The book leaves the reader with the image of the Hermes statue, now standing alone in a museum, still smiling at the baby Dionysus after two millennia.

How It Unfolds

The approach to the sanctuary The journey begins on a bustling road where the boy Charmides observes the diverse travelers and merchants converging on Olympia. He catches his first glimpse of the sacred temple and the golden roof of the structure looming above the valley.

The festival life The narrative captures the atmosphere of the tent city, where the scent of roasting sheep and the sound of music fill the air. Charmides explores the fair, witnessing rope dancers, sword swallowers, and sculptors showing their wares to the expectant crowd.

The games begin The tension shifts to the stadion as the athletes compete for glory before thousands of observers. The narrative details the specific events of the pentathlon, tracking Creon’s progress from the race to the final wrestling bouts.

The victory and the song Creon earns his crown, and the family celebrates the honor brought to their home in Athens. Charmides finds his own quiet triumph by composing a song that captures the spirit of the games and his brother’s success.

The fall of the sanctuary The story moves ahead through the centuries, describing the political and environmental pressures that forced the abandonment of the site. Earthquakes and flooding bury the temples, turning the grand stadium into a forgotten, silt-covered ruin.

The modern recovery The final section follows the systematic excavation of the site, as researchers identify the remains of temples and statues. The discovery of the famous Hermes statue marks the climax of this restorative process, allowing the ancient beauty to emerge once again.

The People

Charmides serves as the emotional lens for the narrative. He is observant, sensitive, and artistic, possessing a deep love for the beauty of the statues and the music of the bards. His physical disability serves as the primary barrier to his participation in the athletic glory of his peers, yet he finds his own path to celebration through his music and his capacity for awe.

Menon, his father, embodies the civic pride and traditional devotion of the era. He is a man of moderate means but high aspirations for his children, willing to invest heavily in his son’s training. His constant prayers and emotional volatility during the games show the pressure placed on fathers of competitors to bring glory back to their home cities.

Creon is the physical ideal. He is the athlete whose life is defined by discipline and divine favor. His belief that the god Hermes guided him to victory highlights the era’s worldview, where athletic success was seen as a blessing from the gods. He is dutiful and successful, yet he remains a bridge between the physical demands of the games and the poetic tributes offered by his younger brother.

The excavators are the final figures of importance. Though they appear only in the latter portion of the book, they are portrayed with reverence. Their work is a labor of love, driven by a desire to reach back into the past and rescue the "buried" history of the Greeks from the silence of the earth.

In Its Own Voice

"If you could be a digger and a finder and could choose your find, would you choose a marble statue or a buried bakeshop with bread two thousand years old still in the oven or a king's grave filled with golden gifts?"

The author poses this question in the foreword to engage young readers in the allure of archaeological discovery.

"Zeus bowed his head. The divine hair streamed back from the kindly brows, and great Olympos quaked."

Charmides recalls these lines from Homer while standing in awe before the massive, gold-adorned statue of Zeus inside the temple.

"But in the museum, in a little room all alone, he stands, always calm and lovable, always dreaming of something beautiful, always half smiling at the coaxing baby."

The author describes the final impression of the Hermes of Praxiteles as it appears to modern museum visitors.

What It's Really About

The central theme of the book is the impermanence of human achievement and the enduring power of art. By juxtaposing the intense, fleeting excitement of the Olympic Games—the "crowns" that fade—with the slow, tectonic shifts of history that bury marble temples, the author explores how civilizations rise and fall. The argument is that while the physical structures of a society may crumble into dust and clay, the spirit of beauty, captured in stone and song, remains a bridge between generations. It asks the reader to consider what we leave behind and what it means to "rescue" the past. The book is an argument for the value of historical curiosity as a means of connecting with our common human heritage.

Why Read It Today

This book is a quiet, contemplative read that feels like a trip to a dusty, sunlight-drenched museum exhibit. Readers who enjoy historical fiction grounded in genuine research will appreciate how the narrative balances the daily life of ancient citizens with the cold, hard facts of the site’s excavation. It is particularly well-suited for those who have an interest in the tactile details of history—what it smelled like to sit under a tent in the heat, or the sound of the Kladeos river against the stone walls.

The prose is warm and accessible, though readers should be prepared for the earnest, slightly moralizing tone common to children’s literature of the early twentieth century. The author does not shy away from the harsh reality of the site’s destruction, and the shift from the vibrant narrative of the games to the cold, analytical description of the ruins creates a poignant, lingering sense of melancholy. While the book is short, it demands a slow pace to appreciate the descriptions of the statues and the atmospheric weight of the sanctuary. It is a perfect choice for anyone looking for a thoughtful, non-sensationalized look at the ancient world that prioritizes human connection over abstract dates and battles.