For sheer, simple grace, the beauty of this stone athletics stadium, within sight of the equally graceful Acropolis, is hard to beat.

This stadium was built in 1896 when the Olympic Games were revived and fittingly held in their original home. Many Greeks were disappointed at not being awarded the 1996 Olympics, though they will be returning in 2004. The 1896 stadium is also named after the Panathenaic Stadium, where contests were held on this site from the 4th century BC onwards. The Olympic stadium follows the same plan as the ancient stadium, which was described by the geographer Pausanias in the 2nd century AD. Architect Ernst Ziller, responsible for many fine late 19th-century Athenian buildings, was commissioned to design the stadium in the spirit of its predecessor.