A New Subway System in Greece Is Decorated With the Artifacts Unearthed During Its Construction

Greece’s second-largest city, Thessaloniki, has finally unveiled its brand new subway system after nearly two decades of construction—which was repeatedly interrupted by discoveries of ancient artifacts and structures. Many of those items ended up staying underground: They’re now on display in the stations themselves.

“Archaeologically, it has been an extremely complex and difficult endeavour,” Lina Mendoni, the Greek culture minister, tells the Guardian’s Helena Smith. “To get here required a battle on many fronts.”

Located in northern Greece on the coast of the Aegean Sea, Thessaloniki has a layered history. The Macedonian city was founded around 316 B.C.E. and named for a sister of Alexander the Great, the king of Macedonia. It was Macedonia’s capital when the region became a Roman province in the second century B.C.E., and it was later ruled by the Byzantines and the Ottomans.

In the 1960s, Thessaloniki became an industrial center. Now, its newest layer is a 13-station subway line complete with driverless trains, which officially opened over the weekend. Commuters will be able to see ancient artifacts inside each “archaeo-station.”

Construction of the metro began in 2006, and tunneling followed ancient commercial routes through Thessaloniki’s center, per the Associated Press’ Costas Kantouris. The digging exposed ancient Greek burials, a Roman thoroughfare, mosaics, plumbing systems, inscriptions and “tens of thousands of artifacts spanning centuries.” Such discoveries cost the project time and money, as workers had to dig deeper tunnels to bypass ancient ruins.

“The project faced substantial delays and many challenges, including over 300,000 archaeological finds, many of which are now showcased at various stations along the main line,” Christos Staikouras, the transport and infrastructure minister, told the AP during a recent media tour. “This project offers a remarkable blend of the ancient and modern, integrating archaeological heritage with metro infrastructure.”

In the subway line’s central station, Venizelou, commuters can see large sections of the reconstructed marble-paved Roman-era thoroughfare. In the Agias Sofias station, they can view a glass case full of colored pottery fragments.

“It is an opportunity for Thessaloniki to become a second Rome, in terms of antiquities,” Melina Paisidou, an archaeologist who worked on the project, tells Reuters’ Alexandros Litsardakis and Alexandros Avramidis.

Thessaloniki’s new metro is Greece’s first fully automated rapid transit system. It’s expected to carry over 250,000 passengers per day, removing nearly 60,000 cars from the congested streets, according to the Guardian. Several additional stations are currently under construction.

The metro, which has already cost more than $3 billion, has long been a controversial project. Angelos Chaniotis, a historian at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, tells the Guardian that Thessaloniki’s archaeological treasures were “sliced horizontally and vertically” and then “stitched together, like a puzzle” to make room for the subway.

However, ahead of a private tour of the Venizelou station, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said the project is “probably unique in the world,” per Reuters. “We will go through an underground museum to reach the train.”

Sonja Anderson | READ MORE

Sonja Anderson is a writer and reporter based in New York City.