Choragic Monument of Lysicrates

This guide to the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates in Athens tells how a wealthy Athenian named Lysicrates built this slender marble cylinder around 334 BCE to display the bronze tripod he won for financing the best boys' chorus at Athens's great theater festival. It traces the monument's odd afterlife: in 1658, French Capuchin friars built a monastery around it and turned the stone drum into their library. You'll also hear about the poet Lord Byron, who lodged in that same monastery in 1810 and wandered its gardens while Athens worked its way into his verse.